A letter from a very special mother to a very special son.
To My Son, Jonathan
Jonnie,
For a very long time now I have intended to write a letter to leave behind for each of my beautiful children so that in case anything ever was left unsaid after I was gone, you would each know how very much I loved you and why you each are so special to me in your own way. I hate so much you are hearing yours like this.
From as far back as I have memories, I knew that what I wanted more than anything was to be a mama. I waited my whole life for you to come along. And when you finally arrived I was beyond ecstatic...but then when they first put you in my arms I was suddenly overwhelmed and terrified. There were a lot of people in my life that I loved very much, and I really thought I knew what love was...but in that very first moment with you I was overwhelmed with a depth of love that I never knew was possible...and it was a depth of love that I wasn’t sure I wanted. I can still remember my exact thoughts, “Oh no. What did I do? I love him too much. I don’t want to love anything this much because if anything ever happens to him for the rest of my life, I’ll never be able to go on living.” I wanted to protect you from every kind of hurt, pain and sadness. At that very moment they were playing on the intercom a song called “The Greatest Love of All.” I remember hearing the lyric, “The greatest love of all is happening to me,” and I looked into your tiny face and thought to myself, “Yes, it really, really is.” I know it won’t surprise you at all to know that by the time the doctor came to check on us, I was in full tears at the thought that when you went to kindergarten someday maybe some other child would tease you and make you sad....maybe even make you cry...and I couldn’t stand the thought of you being sad... ever. (I prudently opted not to tell the doctor why I was crying, lest he deem me insane and remove you instantly from my custody.)
There are so many memories I have always cherished from our very first two or three days together...mainly, I suppose, because I was trying so hard to savor every moment of being your mommy. I didn’t want to forget anything. I tried to commit every inch of you to memory. Your forearm was exactly the length of my index finger and one and a half times it’s width. I LOVED being able to dial the hospital nursery and say, “Can you please bring me my baby,” and knowing that there was a “my baby” to bring. And I will never forget the way daddy gasped when the doctor said, “You have a son.”
I couldn’t get enough of being with you and never wanted to put you down. A nurse came in to deliver my lunch one day. She said, “Give me the baby.” I said, “I want to hold him.” She said, “You can’t have the baby in the bed when you have food. You might spill on him.” I assured her that, no, I would NOT be spilling food on my newborn baby. (I mean, good grief. Who spills food on their brand new infant?!) “It’s a rule,” she said. I told her in that case she could take the food away. She left both you and the food with me...and guess what? I didn’t spill on you at all.
Very soon after your birth I noticed that your head would sometimes shake uncontrollably. It began to happen with greater and greater frequency. Naturally, being that I am me, I decided that you almost certainly were suffering from epilepsy. I couldn’t bear to hear you diagnosed with anything, so I just kept it to myself, growing more and more terrified every time it happened. Finally, just before we were released to go home, I decided that for your sake I was going to have to confess my fears so that you could receive treatment. I got up my nerve and told the nurse that I was very concerned because your head kept shaking...and then I held my breath, bracing myself for the awful confirmation. She asked a few questions, checked you out and then informed me that what you were doing was a natural newborn behavior called “rooting,” and that it simply meant that you were hungry. Oops.
They sent us home with a variety of baby paraphernalia...some of which was very much a mystery to us. God forbid we should have simply asked them what it all was. Among the items was a blue rubber bulb syringe. It seemed perfectly obvious to me that we were supposed to use it to suction out every drop of mucous between your nose and your brain each night before bed to keep you from suffocating during the night. Daddy questioned whether I was certain that this was absolutely necessary, as it upset you every time and left us dealing with a very wide awake and screaming baby. But he went along with it, if only slightly reluctantly, once I informed him that it was almost certainly a matter of life and death. And just for good measure we turned the baby monitor on loud enough to hear your every breath. The only thing we never really came to a meeting of the minds on was the necessity of my beating on the wall between our bedroom and yours to startle you back into breathing loud enough for us to hear over the monitor.
Apparently you were not amused with our marginal early parenting skills and paid us back in full by demanding to eat every two hours, day and night, for what seems like the first several months of your life...and shooting the remains out the other end with even greater frequency...and typically all over us.
As you grew, it became quickly evident that you were very intelligent and very, curious. Which in a toddler translates to very, very busy. You were then, and remained throughout your entire life, a person who did everything with great exuberance. We had to baby proof our house to a degree that left it just short of a padded cell. We couldn’t have indoor plants because you ate them. We couldn’t have curtains because, well, those just make for the most excellent climbing and swinging opportunities ever. We couldn’t have knickknacks of any sort, and any furniture that could possibly be climbed was bolted to the wall. The electrical outlets, cabinets, refrigerator and toilets were all secured, and leaving toilet paper on a roll anywhere within your reach was just a confetti party waiting to happen. And even then we had to watch you constantly. Even with all of these precautions in place, we got up one morning when you were about two years old to find that you had gotten up early, foiled the refrigerator lock, managed to open a childproof bottle of Amoxicillin and drank the entire thing. There you stood, with the empty bottle in hand and a very a pink mustache. You very proudly announced, “I drink the pink!” Dad said the pharmacist looked at him like he was a criminal when he went to by the ipecac syrup.
When I shopped preschools for you, I was unable to use any criteria that might matter to most parents, such as curriculum or child rearing philosophies. No, I had to do perimeter searches of the premises to seek out potential escape routes and try to determine which school was most escape proof.
When you were small, you enjoyed playing every kind of team sport. Not necessarily so much because you passionately loved each of the individual sports, but because you liked the uniforms. When you were in kindergarten and played both soccer and tee ball, daddy asked you whether you liked tee ball better or soccer. You immediately proclaimed “Tee ball, of course!” When he asked why you said, “Better snacks!”
At age seven you discovered martial arts, and while you did enjoy wearing the uniform and earning the different belts, it was the sport itself that eventually won your heart. In usual Jonathan fashion, you gave it your all, right from the very first. I remember watching you try to do your front kicks so high and so hard at first that you would knock yourself right on your back. What a pleasure it has been to watch you grow and improve over these many years into a skilled martial artist and a formidable opponent. This February, in fact, marks your 20th year as a martial artist. As I conceded last time we sparred, you could have owned me in a heartbeat. Even though it was obvious to us both, I’m pretty sure you got a good bit of pleasure out of hearing me admit it out loud. You’re welcome. I will always treasure the memory of our last sparring match, just last Friday evening...most especially because when it was over you opened your arms really wide and gave me that big, sweet hug that I will never forget.
I have always been proud of you for so many, many things. Your work ethic has amazed me since you were a child. Not that your room or the messes you left in my kitchen were ever of much apparent concern to you, but when you had a job of any kind, you always gave it your all....even as a young boy. You graduated from college at a time when jobs befitting your level of education were almost impossible to come by. You never complained about working in restaurants or selling shoes. You just did your jobs, no matter what they were, and gave your all. In fact, from what I have been hearing over the past several years, you didn’t just do your jobs, but went far and above what was asked or required of you. And you were always respectful and appreciative of the employees in your charge. It is no wonder to me at all that you finally ended up with your wonderful job at Concentra, which both challenged you and brought you such joy.
You were such an honest person, a loyal friend, a wonderful son and an amazingly loving big brother to both Christian and Dani.
I am so thankful for the relationship that we had. I am thankful that we always just said what we felt, good or bad, and worked from there. I am thankful that there is nothing left unsaid and no regrets between us. I have no doubt that you know how much I love you and how incredibly proud I always have been of you. And I know that you loved me too. I am thankful that we told each other that almost every day. I am thankful that I had the privilege of being your mother every single day of your life and that I was blessed with the most incredible opportunity to be a stay at home mom. I thank daddy for that. He worked so hard to make that possible for us.
And although I once feared that I couldn’t go on having any sort of life if you weren’t with me, I’m really going to try to keep living a life that would make you proud. I don’t think you would want your legacy to be leaving those of us that loved you best hurting forever. Dad, Christian, Dani and I will take care of each other until we see you again. We’ll miss you terribly, but we’ll also be happy for you, knowing that you’re surrounded by the one true Greatest Love of All.
I have only one favor to ask, and if you can’t do it, I’ll understand. But If there’s any way you can visit me in a dream or somehow just let me know you’re near sometime it would be incredibly awesome. I know that you’re with God. But you know me, I always appreciate that call just letting me know you arrived safely.
I love you,
Mama
PS We’re loving Ulysses for you. Please watch over Dylan and the others for us until we’re all together again.
