Dear Bee // 53

Dear Bee,

I find it an odd mix of difficulty/ease to sit down and write these letters to you. On one hand, it’s simple. Easy. There’s just so much to say – you are a fountain of exuberance, this helium balloon that floats around our home dancing with energy and zest and joy – and the pure humor you’ve brought into our lives is all so worthy of documenting. But on the other hand, I don’t feel a need to document it quite as much, because it’s clearer – this good amidst the hard. I don’t have to look for it. The good is all around us, permeating these walls, securing support beams for our family’s foundation.

When you were a newborn, Bee, it was harder. I had to squint to see the good, and at times I had to squeeze my eyes so tightly that I couldn’t see anything in front of me at all. Life felt heavier then, and I know enough now to know it was simply a mix of postpartum hormones and the rocky roads any transition will bring. (Does the famous “It’s not you, it’s me” apply here? Yes? Perfect.)

Still, I felt off-kilter. And I needed to steady myself on the beauty; I needed to fix my eyes on the good. So I wrote. And I wrote and I wrote and I wrote, and it felt like I was writing for you but Bee, really, I was writing for me.

And now, I don’t feel like I need to write for me, at least not in the same way. I don’t need the daily – almost minutely – reminders to enjoy the still, small moments, because there are so many of them. We have an excess. Writing it all down would feel superfluous – it would take days – and I just really want to sit down and build another tower with you, you know? I want to settle into our days together – grocery store errands and play dates and crock pot dinners and Saturday morning adventures to the coffee shop.

Is it a trap, Bee? Is this what it means to take for granted these moments together? The idea that they’re enough, that they supersede all need for documentation? Am I kidding myself that I won’t need to write it down to remember the beauty of these toddler days?

Maybe. Maybe not.

Yesterday, during breakfast, we shared the following exchange:

“Mama, where are the eggs?”
“We don’t have any; I forgot to get some at the store.”
“Why did you forget to get some at the store?”
“I’m not sure; maybe I was distracted?”
“Why were you distracted?”
“Because I was thinking about something else.”
“Why were you thinking about something else?”
“Because I do that sometimes. It can be a bad habit, but it can also be a really big blessing.”
“I think it’s a really big bressing. I want to forget things every single day.”
“Me, too.”

And I think you cracked the code, sweet Bee. It’s in the forgetting that we learn and grow and improvise. And sometimes, it’s in the forgetting that we remember.

XO,
Mama

  • “Where’s daddy bicycle? In the garage, sweetie, so it won’t get wet. Oh, dry.” And when exactly did he learn the concept of dry?? These are purely magic days, these early twos. I’m learning so much from Forrest and writing down/taking pictures of barely anything. You’re right – there’s too much to document and I just want to sit down and read another book!

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