It's late, and I've been working on too many things again today. But I had something I wanted to say, and even though I should be heading to bed, I need to say it. But I tried writing it down, and it didn't work. Type, select, cut. Delete. Backspace. I really did try to write about that first morning you woke up at home. At our home. I remember it being so hot, so very, very hot. I remember turning my head to look out of our bedroom window, confused...the heat didn't match the bare tree limbs and the brown grass that remained tired from a long winter. It wasn't supposed to be that hot. Not then.
I was going to write about how confused I was that morning, how tired, how sore I was. I felt so heavy, but how to illustrate that? I was going to write about how I woke up not remembering much. I was in a fog, confused. Perhaps I only had an hour or so of sleep, and most likely it was one of those deep, short sleeps which are so hard to come out of. But I knew I had to come back from wherever it was I was lost, because I had to do something.
But I couldn't remember what it was.
I was tired.
I'm tired now. And I can't figure out how to say all of this.
I was going to write about how I laid in bed, confused. How as the ceiling fan whirred overhead that morning, my head began to clear. Slowly, slowly remembering. Slowly remembering YOU. Down the hall. In your crib. YOU.
When I was little, I could never fall asleep on Christmas Eve. I would panic that the morning would never come. But eventually sleep would come, that deep, deep sleep that makes us feel so heavy. When I would finally wake, I woke as I did every other morning, not realizing that Christmas had come. And then slowly it would dawn on me, and I would be shocked at how I could forget something LIKE THAT for even just a moment.
That is how I woke up that first morning you were home.
I was going to write about all of this, maybe form it into some sort of poem, or maybe write it in a haunting third person. But nothing was working. I couldn't figure out how to represent the ceiling fan, the curtains blowing, the heat. How that I felt like I was still in a dream as I walked down the hall to your room, that dark hall, with your door just standing ajar. How to write about pushing your door open quietly, so as not to wake you, how to write about walking slowly to your crib, wondering if you really were there, was it just a dream. And if it wasn't a dream, and if you were there, were you too hot in this surprise heat. I wish I could explain my feelings as I saw you curled up like a bean, how I knew that this was no dream. Seeing you there, real, in your crib, in our home, I felt like I had received the most precious gift there is. I remember being shocked that I could forget something LIKE THAT for even just a moment.
So, I didn't write about all of that in some fancy way. I didn't put into a poem, how, seven years later, I still tiptoe into your room, pushing your door open quietly to peek in on you. I wasn't sure how to explain that today you still sleep curled up like a bean, with your legs pulled up and your arms tight around your two beloved blankies, both of which were in that crib on that morning.
I wish I could use beautiful language to illustrate the thoughts in my head, these thoughts seven years later. I still remember that morning as if it were yesterday. I still see your baby face as you sleep tonight. And I still feel like that kid on Christmas morning whenever I remember that you are mine.
Happy Birthday, Chuckles.
