Dear A,
You just completed your 8th rotation around the sun and now are filling life up with all the things that will make this year special. I hope the list is long.
You, my sweet girl, want deeply, but not for large things in life. You yearn for a kitten, for paid products on Roblox and Minecraft, to tag along with your older sisters and their friends, and candy. Your birthday was simple– you wanted to see your cousin, you wanted to go to the local candy store, and you wanted to run around some green space. I love that. That your wants are just as deep as your older sisters and clear, but big in way much different than M. They fill up spaces the most lovely ways. They fill you up in ways that, I hope, will never leave you bitterly unsatisfied with the challenges of life.
This year, the goofballs that surround your life, made up a nickname that you embraced: chopstick legs. This is because your legs are long. And when I stop to think about it, darling girl, much of you is “long.”
Your frame is beautifully long. Your dancers legs are lean and stretch for miles. Your stories last and last and last as you wind your way through all the things you want to include. You have a loving heart that is long lasting despite all the small barbs I know are sometimes thrown your way. You have a will power that goes on and on when you set your mind to it and you can not be swayed off task. I love all the things make up the wonderful person you are and in ways that will serve you for the years that stretch ahead.
You were made for this life you have. We didn’t have a middle child in my home growing up, so I didn’t know that you’d always be in the in between. It is harder than I understood for you. Yet, you always bend, but never break. You let life with older sisters roll off you like a water bird who never gets wet. You make their teasing powerless as you take ownership of the things they meant to stick to you annoying. You find a way to make it a stepping stone in building yourself instead of a small weight that might keep you grounded. You can equipped to love yourself through it all.
I am learning how to parent it without a road map for all of it– we’re blended and these sisters come and go. You always stay. A big and a little sister depending on the weekend. You get two parents only that will raise you in the same house. Your two older sisters get something different. It is hard, but it is our family’s thing. Each year we learn more about how to walk this life and the ways it impacts you.
Anyway, your big sisters love you, they just don’t have the developed muscle of patience or the the grace to let you be little like they have already done. I’m trying to teach them. I’m trying to pull you through it in ways that have you bend less. Sometimes it would be nice to just watch you grow straight up like they have. Yet, despite my mama heart worrying about it, I recognize this might be you being long again. You might be a twisty beautiful vine that grows in a winding way and makes the most imperfect things beautiful. You grow and thrive in ways that make me so proud to share life with you.
It was a long year. You spent it in the global pandemic. Every human feeling we could have has happened in such a short period of time. We felt grief and fear and happiness and joy. I hope Dad and I showed you that you can naigate hard times thoughtfully and despite not knowing exactly how things will turn out. I hope you realized we can make the best of bad situations always by not getting mired in the fact things can be scary or seem overwhelmingly hard. We don’t run away. we still help as much as we can, we get creative and find new ways to fill our needs. You are a human who always finds the sunshine and I hope we showed you how important showing others’ where the light is can be.
In your seven years in the world, you have brought us so much joy. I can’t believe I lived so long without loving you. I was waiting for you and never knew it. You taught me so much about how a heart makes room and love is infinite. We’ve painted and skipped and climbed and laughed and sat together in tears. Being your mom seems like one of the best things I could ever do with my life.
I am so excited to see what this year of being eight will bring us and how much you’ll grow. You make life so wonderful and we love you, A. Happy birthday, dear daughter.
Love,
Mom
Love, Mom 