Letters to a dear boy

May 19, 2011

Dear Boy:
Tomorrow is your 10th birthday. On the one hand, it feels as if a lifetime has passed in these 10 years. But on the other hand, I feel I have hardly taken an adequate breath. I have not had time to stare at the dimple in your cheek or feel the soft wispy hair as it grows from buzzed fluff into hair befitting of a ten year old. You are halfway to 20 now. I will blink once more and you will be calling home from a dorm room. Or worse, not calling home from a dorm room. How has it gone so quickly?

When I stop to reflect on all of the things that grabbed hands to make your miracle happen, I get almost weepy. You are too meant to be. Too amazing. Too good to be true. But you are true. And you are mine. For now. I love you. Happy Birthday. Happy 10th Birthday.

-mom

P.S. Your friend’s mom keeps calling me and it’s 10:30 p.m., so I may have to take some of this back if this keeps up. Just kidding.

October 28, 2000 (almost exactly 7 months before his arrival)

Dear Baby:
While I haven’t yet seen you with my eyes, I am able to picture you in my mind and you are beautiful. And although I don’t yet have you to love, I can tell you that I love you already.

At this moment, everything about you is a mystery to me…what you will look like, what color eyes you will have, your cry, your voice, your talents, your interests…I know nothing of these things. But one thing I do know is that you are special. you are a gift from God that is coming as an answer to many, many prayers. You have been prayed for by more people than we could count. It is my hope that, as you go through life, you will have a sense of your life’s special purpose, knowing with confidence that you were loved and longed for before you were even born. If you ever have doubts, I hope the words from these pages can dispel them. Everything I have done in my life up until now has led me to this: to light a path for you that you can always find, no matter what you are facing.

I have seen you in my dreams many times. I can hardly wait to meet you face to face.

Dear Baby –
Figuring out what to name you has been a much harder task than I first thought it would be. We considered Pookie, which is of German descent and means “cute person,” but I think we’ve decided to take a more traditional approach. Two days ago, we wrote down all the different name choices on a barf bag from an airplane. Someday this will make you proud. Your name–whatever it may end up being–is loosely connected to vomit. I  hope we won’t give you a name that will cause you to suffer through elementary school. But if we do, and your name ends up rhyming with something it shouldn’t or whatever else, just know that it wasn’t for lack of trying. It’ll be because we were too stupid to see it coming.

April 27, 2001

Dear Baby,
We have believed from Day 1 that you are out there waiting specifically to come to us. We are not searching for just any child. We are searching for you. We believe that nothing is going to keep you from us. We aren’t really going to fully understand this until we are a happy family looking back on these early days. But we trust God. We trust that right now — April 27, 2001 at 9:16 p.m. — God is watching over you, baby. And right now, at this very same moment, God is also watching over us. He will bring us together at the right time for all the right reasons. I know there will be times and situations that you don’t understand through your years as a young person. In those times, we pray that you will trust God. He has been holding you in the palm of his hand from the very beginning. As we continue to wait, we love you.

-mom