Things in Common

Dear Babies,

Tonight I rocked the Little One while you, Curly and Louise, were snuggle buddies upstairs.  Soon the house was quite and it was just me sitting in the semi darkness, letting my mind wander as it so often does.  And, as it so often does, it wandered all over but constantly came back to touch on each of my three every few seconds.  One track mind I suppose, even when it's supposedly free.  I thought about your gorgeous hearts and faces and your brilliant little minds and how each of you individually makes me laugh and breaks my heart in the best kind of way.  I wondered again at what a miracle it is to not only be a mother, something a previous me was never particularly planning on, but even more so what a pure gift it is to have daughters.  So what if you're 3 and 5 and 3 months.  You're my babies and my best girlfriends all rolled into one, and you'll simply never escape that....

One of the best elements of this part of my life is that right now I know you adore me every bit as much as I do you.  I see it in your eyes and feel it in the sparks that fly when you invite me into your beautiful worlds and I have the good sense to accept.  And I just want you to know that I'm storing it up.  In a great big invisible warehouse where there is infinite room for more.  Because I know there will likely come a day, or a week, or an era (oh, please bless, not a long, horrible era) when you forget for a moment that I'm your darling mother.  It will likely be my fault, but maybe it will be yours, or probably a little bit of both.  I'm gonna hate it.  Fully.  But you should know I intend to stick to my guns about all of it, live on the love I'm hoarding now so I can do what's best for you.  And don't worry, this will all come full circle and we'll come right back to this place eventually, except it will be new and improved.  Mammy and I did.  But I'm hoping when you and I are in the middle of whatever temporary mess we create for ourselves, that maybe you'll read this.  I'm getting it in print for you:  You're my favorite.  In some ridiculous, jaw-dropping way.  I loved you when you were chubby and smiling and emitting that delicious baby perfume.  I loved standing in the dark for hours, doing the Texas two step and humming Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's "Fishing in the Dark" with you in desperate attempts to coax you to sleep.  I loved you when you glued things to the wall or gave yourself a swirly and a haircut or committed any other horribly hilarious (or not so hilarious) misstep.  I loved you when you triumphed and I loved anyone else who could ever see the faintest glimmer of how wonderful you were.  And I love you now.  No matter what.  I just can't help it.

So read this later, ok?  You might think it's false.  But read it again a while later, and you'll see.  It's nothing short of the truth.  Love you,

Mama