Falling
by
We love people for who they are on the inside: how they treat us and others and how they make us feel. We want so much to have that love in a tangible way—so we can touch it, feel it, know it is real—that we fall in love with the person’s very humanness: You love the gentleness of the soul and find that gentleness in the shape of their fingernails. You love the person’s capacity to forgive and see that in their deep, beautiful eyes. You love their voice, the words they say and find that beauty in the curl of their lips. You love how well they listen to you and find your fingers outlining the curves of their perfectly shaped ears.
When I fell in love with Captain Sarcastic over a decade ago and hitched my wagon to his star, the only regret I had was the knowledge that if this was IT, I’d never fall in love again. Sure, you re-connect and re-fall in love, but it isn’t the same as finding someone new and falling in love with their humanness for the first time.
No one ever told me that the romantic notion we have about falling in love is every bit applicable to the love you feel for your child. I smell Sun’s hair or milky breath, I hear her say “Nite, nite, Mommy,” I feel her holding my fingers and plucking my fingernails, and every aspect of her humanness, and my discovery of it, has my earth shaking beneath me. I want to squeeze her and never let go. And when her thin little arms snake around my neck and return my hug, I melt. There is nothing less in the skipping of my heartbeat now than when I first fell in love with my husband.
And THAT is the truest gift of motherhood.
Still, a few months away from turning 17, when my son asks me for a hug, my heart just melts. They really are always our babies.
.-= Tara R.´s last blog ..Weekly Winners ~ thawing out? =-.
I KNOW! Why doesn’t anyone talk about that? Only one friend ever mentioned it to me before I became a parent. She said “You don’t just love your child…you fall IN LOVE with your child.” Yes, the thrill I get when he comes up with a gratuitous “I love you mommy” is no less than the feeling when I first heard those words from his dad.