Here’s to you, Brooke Elizabeth September 28, 2009

Tweens and Teens coming out of my ears….that is what I was thinking about last night while waiting in the Macy’s dressing room for Brooke and her two best friends to model their next outfit. While waiting, I logged onto my Facebook page from my phone and discovered my son, Zach, recently turned 13, had just “updated my status” to report that I had decided to become a professional football player. Oh boy. We are, for sure, smashing into the teen years.

The time is upon me…no more kids in the single digits. We are on the road and nobody but me seems to be looking back.  We spent yesterday and today celebrating Brooke’s birth. She is ten today. She chose to have two friends spend the night, and we spent the evening at the mall shopping, getting makeovers, and going out to dinner. I watched them up ahead of me, those three beautiful girls, caught up and enjoying the moment. All dressed up and peering into this new stage they are just entering. Then, home we came to put the American Girl dolls to bed. I guess that is truly why they call it the “Tween” years. She is caught between the innocence of a little girl and the emerging young woman she is becoming…she has one foot in each world today.

I told her tonight that this day, September 27, is one of the best days of my life. It’s my special day to be thankful that God gave her to us. I remember that evening, ten years ago, when I held her in my arms for the first time. She’d been close to my heart for many months, and now she was “here”. The ten tiny fingers and the little rosebud mouth, she was everything and more than I imagined. I had my boy, and now I had my girl, too.

During those first months I hardly put Brooke down. It came to be kind of  a joke in our house. The girl who would not be ignored. She never slept in her crib. Why should she when Mom was willing to hold her close all night? I remember when I finally discovered the Baby Bjorn and could carry her strapped to my front, facing in at first, and as she grew, facing out to see the world around her. Soon, she was off and crawling, then walking, then running. She charged into each day with gusto.

Brooke is such a mix of enthusiasm and sensitivity. She has the confidence to try new things, and yet, she can be so sensitive at times that I do not know how to handle her. Just last week she auditioned for a part in a play. Up in front of total strangers she belted out her audition song, complete with movements. I was in awe. I had no idea she could do that. Really. And then, just a few days later at her first play practice I saw the side of her that moves into a new situation with trepidation, and measures the success of the encounter by whether or not she has a friend to share it with. The contrast between the sheer nerve she had to audition and the fear she felt at going to practice alone without a friend struck me.

That is one of the things I love about mothering. It’s learning to hold the contrasts and contradictions in one hand. We are complicated, and she is no exception. As Brooke swings between the emotions, I hover over frustration, or wonder, or exhaustion, or delight. Or maybe all four at the same time. And learning to hold it all is a good thing. It reminds me that the best I can do for her is to hold all of her parts and love all of them, while also holding all of my parts and loving all of them. And I can tell you one thing for sure, some of my parts I sure don’t like. They ain’t too pretty. But they are part of me, and what makes me Kim. It’s easier to love the contrasts in someone else. I am quick to forgive, when it’s someone else’s ugliness.

I see Brooke’s complexity and I find it lovely. And I am reminded of the truth that my Father finds my complexity lovely, too. So here’s to you, Brooke Elizabeth. Here’s to the delightful girl you are, and the beautiful woman you are becoming. Here’s to all the times you remind me to love and forgive and keep going. Here’s to the abandonment you live with….abandoned to love and appreciation for the wonder in your life. May you never lose that. May you always walk through life knowing that the beauty that is inside of you far outweighs the beauty you carry on the outside….and your outsides are pretty fantastic. I love you, Punky.

Mom