Since Asher began crawling and then pulling himself up on various items of furniture, I have been struck with the passage of time. He will be one year old at the beginning of June, and that fact is remarkable. If you have kids, you know what I am talking about (and possibly much more).
With this thought comes the inevitable Elizabeth sentimentality, when imagining him as a teenager and a grown man is becoming more frequent.
As I watch him lose his footing or discover the doorstop sorta smarts, my achy-breaky heart tears a little more. When I inflict injury while tripping over Mother Nature's apron strings - those moments you can't believe are possible - forget about it. They can hear my heart break in Toledo. And we're only at nine months old, people.
In so many ways his own heart will break. Show-in-tell hours when he gets picked on for the stamp collection, the laminated baseball card of the "loser" outfielder, or the pet turtle he feeds raisins. Endless moments in which his tongue will get stuck when talking to that special girl (or boy). Minutes of pure sweat when the critical answers don't come during an exam.
Then, even worse...finding out there is real grief in the world, that it's possible to lose a job or a loved one. That natural disasters can occur without warning.
I can't save him from any of these things, a reminder that happens almost daily with the spills and tumbles. And I begin to glimmer the bravery we both must grow, the ultimate trust we must have in each other and in ourselves. They don't pass out those kind of guts in any delivery room. Or so it feels.
I guess I am off to see the Wizard, with my little one in hand.
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