To My Last-Born Child: This Is It

It takes only a look from those evening sky eyes, so much like your daddy’s, before I’m lost in time, lost in space, lost in a world where only you and I exist.

It takes only one sweet, joyful smile to send me reeling, end over end, in a twister of tears, for the growing up and the getting older and the never again.

It takes only one slobbery kiss to crawl all the way down to my depths and remind me, This is it.

This is it. You are it. You are the last-born son.

We knew it from the first moment we knew of you. You grew and you kicked and you formed so perfectly, so beautifully, so wonderfully, and I tried to enjoy every minute of your growing, before I’d even met you, because this was the last time.

It’s funny how a new baby comes into a family by storm, how those first few months feel blurry and unreal, and then, looking back, it’s hard to remember a time when new baby was no baby. I try to see what life was like before you, and it’s impossible to remember what I did with my nights but give you the last goodnight, sleep-tight kiss.

It’s impossible to remember what I did with my mornings but burrow my face into your belly to make you laugh. It’s impossible to remember afternoons without your curled-up form, sleeping soundly in a crib.

Ours is not a complete family without you.


Rachel Toalson
Rachel Toalson
Rachel is a writer, poet, editor and musician who is raising six boys to love books and poetry and music and art and the wild outdoors—all the best bits of life. She shares her parenting articles at Crash Test Parents. She blogs on life and love and family on her web site. She co-hosts the podcast In the Boat With Ben, sharing wisdom about intentional parenting and the pursuit of a creative career.

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