dear eldon.

Dear Eldon,

 

Perhaps the greatest pleasure I will ever know, is watching you grow. From the first moment I held your tiny hands with one finger and breathed in your newborn milky breath over and over in hopes that I would never forget the caramel scent on your lips.

 

I wished for time to stand still, and also for a quick glimpse into the future.

 

I wanted nothing more than a nap and a shower, except to hold you for 20 more minutes first.

 

I celebrated your first steps and took pride in your first words...and then I cried for the end of the chapter we left behind.

 

You took one step and then sprinted into a world of possibilities, discoveries, and growth.

 

Here we are, four and a half years later. Soon I will watch you blossom into a big brother. I know that you are going to rock this role, and also that it means the end and beginning of yet another chapter.

 

Right now though, you are still my only.

The boy who turned my world upside down. The boy who taught me what it feels like to love so much it hurts. The boy who made me Mommy.

 

You are wild.

 

That's really a nice way of saying you are obnoxious, which you are also.

 

Your personality shines through your eyes. Happy, smart, goofy, loving, and increasingly sarcastic, which you come by honestly.

 

Your favorite color is yellow...unless it's red.

 

You dance all over the living room when you play Mario and squeal when you get to Bowser.

 

You build me flowers out of legos, and insist that I smell them.

 

The smirk that takes over your face when I lip sync in the car is well worth the strange looks I get at stoplights.

 

You cry after losing your temper and you mean it when you apologize.

 

You prefer jumping and flying to walking, and if ever my shadow is cast across the parking lot, you giggle to tears until you catch it.

You like punk rock and the spanish channel. I can try to make you fall in love with the music I like instead, but you feel it in your soul, and you love to dance. That's good enough for me.

 

Your heart is wise beyond it's years. When you see struggle, you are compelled to help. I love this and more about you, but this...I hope you never lose this.

 

You are everything that childhood magic is. Watching you "beat bad guys" in the backyard and build laser alarms out of yarn makes me wish I could escape to that world in your head and play like a child again. When you lay in bed next to me at night, you seem content that you have saved the world, yet again.

I often wonder what type of adult you will be, or how much hell you will give me when you're a teenager. I try to picture what you will want to be when you grow up. For now, it's a construction worker, a courtesy clerk, and Superman.

 

I am excited for you to add big brother to your resume, and I know that it means I get to witness an all new transformation...for both of us.

 

I hope that when I rock your brother to sleep, you will get to witness the love I have for both of you from the outside looking in. I hope that you will remember how I nursed you until your eyes rolled back and milk dripped down your cheek.

 

Don't grow up too fast. Being a big brother is alot of work, but I promise time for shadow tag, starbucks dates, and for "putting good dreams in your head" every night.

 

These things, I want you to know. Before life takes us down another road and our relationship takes on new dimensions. This is you now. This is us and the relationship we have built. It is an ongoing project and as we build it up, I want you to see your brother as a helping hand. Together we will teach him how to play shadow tag. Someday, he will likely be your best friend.

I wonder how I can possibly love another son as much as I love you, but the closer we are to getting Max here, the more I come to realize that a mother's love is infinite. It stretches beyond time, logic, and reason. It does not run out and there is always more than enough.

 

I hope that when Max is four and a half, and you are nearing ten, you will help him to see this magical world that you live in.

 

I hope that you live in it for as long as you can.

 

I love you to the moon.

 

but you already knew that.

 

 

Love,

 

Mom