Memories

Today, my oldest son's third birthday, is a simple day I want to remember forever. I want to always be able to picture him stacking his birthday pancakes on top of his cup of milk, perusing the pumpkin patch and declaring a soft, green one perfect, and the look of his sweet face drifting into contented sleep in the backseat of the car. He is only three and yet he has grown so much, changed so much since the day he was placed on my bare stomach, purple and wiggling and just a few seconds old. I have learned so many things since that day: how to survive without sleep, how to eat cold food without complaining, how to take a shower in three minutes flat with my head half out the door. I've learned how to change diapers, how to bandage some nasty cuts that made me cry, and how to carry a sleeping child in from the car without waking him. I've learned to love with all my heart, and I've learned to be more dependable and responsible than I ever thought I could be. I've learned the patience my parents always wished I had, and how to do more things at once than "The Cat in the Hat" could do.

In the years to come there will be kindergarten and new friends, long school days and cafeteria money to remember. Sports practice, music lessons, reading and writing. Drivers ed. School dances. College applications. There will be late night conversations and early morning slammed doors. Shouting and laughing, joking and ignoring. There will be love, joy, and sadness; all of the memorable moments that happen on a daily basis. The life of a parent is full of the mundane and the miraculous, the boring and the beautiful, the never-ending and the never wanting it to end.

And that is not all, oh, that is not all...