You know, everyone tells you how fast it goes. They say, "Just wait! You'll turn around one day and wonder what happened to the little bundle you brought home." I am actually polishing up my version of this cliche statement to deliver to my sweet sister at the end of the month. We'll be travelling home to Texas to visit her and meet her baby girl for the first time.
But, as many times as I heard it, I never imagined the harsh truth of those words. It seems I can barely recall the nights of little sleep, the nursing, the teething and the diapers. Now I watch this little person descend the stairs each morning in awe of who he is and prayerfully anticipating who he will become.
Childhood is so full of bittersweet moments. Like Sunday night when my son was reunited with a friend whom he has not seen for 4 months and pleaded, "Mommy, can I spend the night with Trinity?" My child has never spent a night away from either Rudy or I. It just really has never come up. I was shocked that he wanted to and fully anticipated that he would be crying about 30 minutes after I left. I was so wrong. He was as cool as a cucumber the entire time and really didn't even seem to have missed us when he returned the next day! Big boy.....
This past Friday he went to the dentist. He acted very dramatic when I told him he would be going a few days prior to his appointment. He put on his best worried face and said, "But, but, but..." I assured him it would be fine- that the dentist just wanted to look at his teeth and make sure they were growing in and healthy. "...but will there be prizes?", he finished. "Probably," I said. "OK, MOMMY! I WILL GO AND I WILL BE REALLY BRAVE!".
He did and he was. He chatted up the dentist and his assistant to everyone's amusement. Then I watched him write his name in chalk on the "No Cavity Club" wall.
He has really surprised me with this new confidence and assertiveness. This is the boy who clung to me from 5 months to 20 months of age- the child who sobbed and choked when we left him in childcare at church. Surely it has been a gradual process, but it seems to have happend so suddenly to my heart.
These "big boy" moments are pressing me to make a new resolution. I am really going to do my best to soak up as much of him as I can. To make note of the funny things he says and cherish every nanosecond he spends in my lap. This last year before school becomes his occupation and friends are cooler than Mom and Dad is going to be so bittersweet. I am going to have to be a big girl to cope with all of this big boy stuff.
