This is a reminder that there is something beautiful in me.
She is NOT me.
But I made her...partly.
Cecily is number three. She is still baby, still smiles and snuggles, and funny faces. She is 21-month-old-precociousness. Everything she does is the delight of parent who wants to feel responsible for all things good about her. But she is showing signs - signs that while she is flesh of my flesh, she is mind of her mind.
Cecily has two older siblings - four and seven. So with a few more years experience in these two, I begin to wonder how much I am truly responsible for. Children choose their behavior, but is it not formed by what they see? I am afraid to think about what they see. Because it's pretty much all me.
I don't want to take the blame for a good deal of what goes on in my children's behavior. But I want the credit for what is pretty.
There is still a lot of pretty. In all three of them. I should videotape it for happy viewing after non pretty episodes.
With Cecily....I will close my eyes and inhale slowly these last few months of baby. I will miss her, as I miss all my children at every stage. But there is such thrill in meeting them again and again in the unveiling of new character as they become the self that is, eventually, entirely independent of me.
3 comments:
I believe you have captured and expressed so beautifully the mind of a mother. Seeing your children grow and develop and become more and more independent in incremental ways is thrilling and saddening at the same time.
I love your posts. Your thoughts and words are beautiful to me and I am eternally grateful to call you sister.
independent, but not entirely... at least not in my mind. I have scars from some things that linger still even though I want to shake them off. and sometimes do. But a lot of the good in me is still from her. And always will be. It is from her goodness that I am in part who I am. Just as the goodness that your children have will in part be given from who you are.
At least we can hope eh?
and do breath it in, my baby is as old as your big boy. It goes ever to quickly. (and not enough on some days!)
i want to eat your babies face jessie, she is sooo cute. can't wait for the next one to come along. you should bring the kids up here again sometime this summer :)
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