How many more scrawled love notes will come home from school? How many more months (weeks? days?) will he crawl up on the couch with me EVERY time he sees me there with a blanket on, requisitioning half the covers, squishing his arm against mine. How many more times will he reach for my ear when he’s really tired, and rub it instead of his own? How many more times will he search for and gleefully find his teddy bear before bedtime, delight sparking in his eyes when he finds his beloved nighttime friend?
I don’t know the answer to those questions.
I know only this: I’m not going to try to keep him stuck in his babyhood, but I’m not going to hurry him along to the next stage, either. What I am going to do, is savor. Savor every last moment of every “last,” and every last moment of every “first,” as this little boy becomes a big boy, a teenager, a man.
Because the truth is, there’s joy and delight in every stage. He may be my last baby, but I’m his only mama. And him being mine is the greatest privilege I could hope for or imagine.
***
As I lay in bed, drifting off quickly, I feel his breath on my hair and I smile softly and whisper a prayer of thanks for this awakening, and all the ones still to come.
