Crazy Eight

3 years old

Dear Emelyn,
It's 10:00 p.m. the night of your birthday, and I finally have you and your sister and brother settled in. You were the last to drift off, opting for the trundle bed next to a still-writhing K over the top bunk above the stillness of your sister's sleeping. "It's too lonely in my room," you said.

You didn't know why you couldn't sleep. You thought maybe it was school--school seems to be boring lately, you told me. It seems like it's all connected and never ending. I think you meant that you want more time at home to play with your new birthday gifts. Life can get so busy during the week, it is hard to find enough time for that exploring, wild, resting place called play. I curled next to you on the trundle and stroked the bridge of your nose like we did when you were a restless babe. Still, you didn't sleep. Finally, I retrieved my cup of tea and school work. I perched myself in the rocker next to you and you fell asleep in the space we three held together. You kept me in your sights while your eyes grew heavy and drew closed. Just so.

You are a girl who needs wide open spaces. You are wide-eyed and wonder-seeking, curious and experimental, independent and delicate. You need your own space, not free of Mom and Dad and brother and sister, but tucked inside of our family unit. You need us to be there and not be there.

Today launched a year of crazy eight. I haven't heard too many parents discuss the trials and tribulations of a child's eighth year. In fact, to my mind, eight and nine seem like the peaceful holding tank between early childhood and puberty. They must be such benign years, such easy going years.

Not so for you, my love, who soaks up all the details and nuances and complexities of daily living with intensity even I cannot match. "I don't like it that I can never be good,"  you told me the other night with worry resting on your brow.

"What do you mean?" I asked, feeling a sweep of guilt come over. What have I done? She thinks she's not good enough! I rushed to dire conclusions.

"There's always sin in the world," you replied. "I don't like that. It means I can never be good."

My arms wanted to reach around you and bring you close, but your body language told me this was one of those times I should hold back. Restrain affection but not love. "Well, yes, I suppose that is true," I told you. "There is sin. And bad things sometimes happen. But God didn't create us to feel bad about that all the time. He made us for love and that means there are many, many good things that we do. It also means we have many gifts we can use in order to do this good. He created you and loves you just as you are." I'm not sure I convinced you to see things my way, but you're a thinker and I think these talks we have percolate.

In fact, I know they do, because sometimes the ones I don't want to remember come back to bite me in your own words; thankfully you often lace them with your good-natured humor. "But I thought (three weeks, four days, and five hours ago) you said we couldn't do X or Y or Z," you remind me as a way of revealing superfluous restrictions I've enacted for the sake of a moment of sanity. "I only said you couldn't (fill in the blank) that one time," I will have to confess. "I didn't mean forever!"

For all the care you wear on your sleeve, you do love a good joke and a deep belly laugh. I love your smile because it lights up your whole face. Do you realize how much glee you add to a room when that laugh is rolling from your deeps? Daddy is my witness that I am helpless to its power at the dinner table. Two nights ago he finally threw his hands up. He was trying to firmly remind you not to burp at the table and the two of us were guffawing, wet eyes locked in mirth. "See?" he will often say in mock disgust. "How can we make any progress here?"

You're also a whiz at noticing things. Your big browns soak up so much information when we go on hikes. You and your sister are our guides for spotting all things natural and interesting of all shapes and sizes. Even the discovery of a single leaf holds a story to tell or a mystery to solve. How do you think it got holes like that? What kind of bug is living there? Is this something we can eat, Mom? The questions pile up faster than we can answer, your curiosity moving at a hearty, breathless gallop.

Here is my birthday wish list for you this year, sweet girl: That you will find joy in the exercises of daily living.  That you will know how precious you are. That you will cultivate and grow a heart of gratitude. That you will let yourself off the hook; life's ups and downs need not be ridden upon with such intensity, my little pookie. I wish I had known this at your age.

A few weeks ago, at a conference on parenting and disability, the keynote speaker cited a study she conducted in which approximately half of all the children she interviewed confessed that they did not think their parents loved them. "Of course these children were all loved by their parents," she told us. "But some were not loved in terms they understood." Later she asked us to write on an index card how we could better show love to each of our children. We had spent some time exploring the five love languages. Our notes could be something we planned to avoid going forward or something we wanted to keep doing or do more. It could even be something we'd never done before. Whatever we wrote had to meet the goal of better loving you in terms you understand and in ways you best respond. When we were finished writing, we enclosed our words in tiny gift boxes, wrapped them in shiny paper printed with silver hearts, and fixed miniature bows to the top. "Put this somewhere you will see it every day to remind yourself how you aim to better express love to your children. It will help you remember when stress, frustration, or just sheer exhaustion threaten to bust up your own best efforts. Your love is their best resource."

Holding Baby Reece for the first time

Would you like to know what I secured in that promise box? I wrote that I would really listen to what you told me (even though you tell so much!), and I wrote that I would use my words to encourage you more so that you always know you are loved. You are welcome here in our hearts and in our lives and in our space just as you are. That box is my promised gift to you. And your love? Well, that's my best resource.

Happy Birthday, Em-doo, my beloved and lovely treasure.