Because I'm Sol's mother. I am Sol's family. I spend 50+ hours a week away from her so that I can provide a beautiful, comfortable life for her. And in those 50+ hours each week, I lose track of time. I get home from a long day at work and forget to look at her... to really look at her and see the beautiful girl that's growing far too much, far too quickly. I forget to look in her eyes and see the swirl of colors... the eyes that were once blue, but now are changing to the most unique shade of brown/gray/blue. I forget to look at the color of her hair and see how perfectly it matches mine. I forget to hold her tiny hands in my palms and see just how tiny they really are compared to mine. I forget to look in amazement at her tiny-but-oh-so-perfect fingernails.
I forget all this, and within a few short weeks I realize she's different. Her sideswept baby bangs are long enough now to tuck behind her ear. I realize that her once-chunky legs are more slender and toned, because OHWAITSHECANWALK. I realize that her feet aren't just luscious little lumps of baby fat anymore and all of a sudden shoes actually fit her; and not just that, but her feet are too big now for the red Toms shoes that I've been trying so desperately to fit around her feet.
It's no wonder the days fly by.
It's easy to do the same thing every day, and not realize that today is 1 day more than yesterday, not realize that today I am 1 day older, that my daughter is 1 day further from the tiny human who greeted the world just a year ago, the tiny human who once fit *just ever so perfectly* in the crook of my left arm. It's not until I rifle through old clothes and hold up a newborn outfit, then a 3m outfit, then a 6-9m outfit, then a 12m outfit, and I see that my baby (and I use that term loosely) doesn't fit into a-n-y of those things, that I realize how quickly my life is racing by.
Most days are the same.
But then there are days like this weekend. Solchop was sick again. Thursday she fell prey to a nasty double ear infection; Friday she was sent home from daycare with a fever. Saturday went downhill really quickly: fever, vomiting, no eating/drinking, screaming, screaming, screaming. So I took her into Bronson and spent the evening watching my little sweets, clad in a peach-hued hospital gown, being pumped with codeine. Sure, it was just an ear infection gone mad. But she was in agony, and while we were sitting on that hospital bed I felt my heart crack open, spilling out lovelovelove for the child wailing on my lap. The child who was in so much pain that she was making herself sick by sobbing. As I wiped up the strings of green mucus that were erupting from her mouth, I couldn't imagine spending Mother's Day weekend any differently. We sat there together amid the mechanical beeps, amid the chatter of the medical staff, and I vowed that I would give anything to somehow magically transfer her pain into my own body. Tears rolling down my cheeks as we sat together in the hospital bed, I held my sick daughter and caressed her bare back beneath the hospital gown as she mellowed into a pharma-induced calm. As I sat there, I wondered if she would ever realize just how much I loved her, just how much I have done for her. Maybe she won't know right away, but I hope she'll understand someday... Someday, as she's sitting up late at night with her own sick child, she'll understand just how much she means to me. You will never know the love of a mother until you experience it yourself.
My dear Sol Haven, I love you so very much and I cherish every second I have with you. You are the reason for everything I do, everything I dream, everything I am. You are the reason I lay awake at night, thinking of what I can do better the next day to make a better life for you. You are the reason I wake up in the morning with confidence and determination, hope and love in my heart, striving to help you grow into the most beautiful human ever to walk this earth. I hope you realize someday just how blessed I feel to be your mother. I live and breathe for you, and you are all I will ever need.
This is why you call me Mom.
** Btw, Sol was sent home later that night,
and although she wasn't feeling great the next morning,
we enjoyed a nice Mother's Day pancake breakfast together.
Ah, love. **
