A letter to a younger me

This photo is on my kitchen wall. I see it every day.  Sometimes I move past it. Sometimes I stop, take it down. I stare into all three pairs of those familiar eyes and I wish there was some way I could speak to them.  

I remember those days as full and happy, although I'm told they were not.  I think there is some revisionist history going on there, but that point aside I would like to talk to that young mom. 

She's gone now, as are the giggling little girls who spent day after day pretending they were horses, swirling in their favorite skirts that billowed out around them as they danced in the kitchen.  She would sew these dresses, and the biggest requirement was that the dresses had to be swirly. I look into those eyes and I'm not sure I recognize her.  She was sure, as she poured herself into crafts on the kitchen table and afternoons at the barn, homeschool Latin lessons and stops for frozen lemonade...she was sure that she was doing a good job. It was the most important job ever, and she poured herself into it.  Days flowed into days.  There were hard days and happy days. Sometimes she got it right. A lot of times she missed the mark. Because becoming a mom never makes you a perfect person.  But still she treasured those days, because she knew that all too soon they would come to an end. And the little girls would grow up, and the relationship would change, because when your kids grow up to adulthood you have a different kind of relationship.  She thought she knew this.  

What she didn't know was that one day she would watch it fall apart, like a slow motion disaster replay.  All of a sudden she knew nothing. And no matter how she tried and prayed and tried again, the giggling girls were gone, in ways she never envisioned.  And she listened as they told her that everything she had done was wrong.  She would try to bring them back. But they would lock themselves in their rooms and seek solace from strangers on Tumblr.  And she looked in their eyes. And they were gone.  She didn't know that her little girl would go on testosterone, grow a beard, and change her name. She didn't know her girl would disappear, and her childhood would be rewritten. 

It's funny how things that used to feel so important just don't matter anymore.  This morning I walked past a wall covered in pink jasmine.  I love that smell.  But it brings me back to a trip to the hip new grocery store with the really nice floral department.  The girls wanted a cookie.  I wanted to buy that jasmine.  But it was $50. For a hanging basket.  The thought of that basket preoccupied my mind for longer than I want to admit.  After several days of agonizing indecision, I bought a plant at Home Depot instead.  Much more practical.  I planted it outside in the little patio area where the blue plastic pool sat.  It's funny I have such a memory of that. Because as I walked past the jasmine this morning, all I could think about was how little any of that matters anymore.  I wonder to myself how I could have ever cared about such things.  

I recently went to Beirut.  It's a big city, shiny tall glass buildings and people talking on their phones while driving.  The war has been over for a long time now.  They could just move on and forget.  But everywhere in that city, next to the sleek modern buildings there are bombed out shells, pocked with bullet holes.  I was told that they keep those buildings up and don't repair the bullet holes, because they don't want to forget. 

Memories and grief are painful and emotionally dangerous things.  They slice through my days like a sharp knife sometimes.  The pain is deep and raw and I barely know what to do with it.  In those moments heaven feels shut and the world goes dark.  It happens almost every day.  I dread it of course. But in a way I need it.  I want to think that those three people will someday, along with their brother who wasn't there the day that picture was taken, will someday be together again.  In some way, when the memories come and the pain comes with them, it ties me back to those days.  The ones I hold on to, because I can't let them go. No matter what happens, I was there. I remember, and they were happy days.  

I won't get a card from my children this year, I won't get flowers. I won't even get a text.  But this I know.  I'm still a mother. And it was still the most important thing I ever did.