A Letter to Biride

Birdie,

You are one tough and tender little thing.

Some night last week found us both in frustrated tears.  I was crying because you were doing everything but going to bed at bedtime and you were crying because I was busy dismantling your bed and carting it out of the room.  (I am also tough.  "You don't want to sleep?  Fine!  You don't get a bed!")  You were crying when you weren't laughing at all the consternation you were causing.  (The power!)  Daddy came in and asked me to leave your room before I'd gotten so far as the bed frame itself, but I noticed that he'd moved it out to the hallway when I came back inside after storming out into the yard and flinging myself into one of the adirondack chairs.  I found you then asleep on the floor, on your tummy with your little bottom in the air.  I carted all the pieces of your bed back in and put it together again, and then put you in it.  (It turns out, I might also be tender.)  You opened your eyes and scowled at being woken, but you hadn't really woken and you went right back to sleep.

This past Sunday was Father's Day.  Daddy and Joe went to a Twins game.  You and I stayed home.  We both napped, but I woke up before you.  I was typing something else here on the computer when suddenly, there you were next to me.  You said you wanted to go on a bike ride, so I pushed you on your trike down to the park.  You were in your sunglasses along with your helmet.  Hot stuff.  Along the way, we passed a house with some purple iris in full bloom in front of it.  I pointed them out to you as we passed.

That night, when I was carrying you to bed, I told you I had had fun with you that afternoon.  You looked at me and said, "My favorite things was. . .the irises!"  I said, "They were purple!  You like purple.  I liked them, too."

You're barely three, so I imagine you won't remember these moments, but who knows?  One of the things you realize as you get older is that some of the things you remember are sometimes sort of funny.  And who's to say that this past Sunday afternoon will remain so etched in my mind?  Sometimes you are in moments and you think, "I'm going to remember this moment always."  But you don't.  Other times, you're in a moment that seems ordinary, and maybe it really is, and you don't think anything about it, and for some reason, that moment is one of the most vivid pictures your heart carries.

It could be you'll remember our walk past the iris, and me carrying you into bed, and the way you sometimes reach up and pull me to you so, so tight.

It could also be that you'll remember that I once dismantled your whole bed and carted nearly all of it out of your room.

It could be you won't remember any of it.

So I am writing these words to you so that in any case, you'll know that the Father's Day when you were three, we shared a sweet afternoon.  (And, I suppose, that I once carted your entire bed out of your room.)  And, that I love the way you pull the things you love to you and hold them so close.

Love you so much, Birdie Birds.

Mommy