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I can't take complete credit for this and there are a ton of similar type articles out there, but much of it is my own words. It's something I've held on to for the past 5 years waiting for you to get old enough to understand the meaning behind it, but also when it might be needed most. Sometimes I think I should have sent it sooner, and yet now seems like the perfect time for you to read it.
Please don't skim through it like you're prone to do with other blogs, articles, posts, etc. These words are from the heart and I want you to keep them close for those days you really need to hear/read something uplifting and positive. Read it in Morgan Freeman's voice if you must. Just read it ALL.
1. It is not your job
to keep the people you love happy.
Not me, not mom, not your brother or sisters, not your friends. I promise, it's not. The hard truth is that you can't, anyway.
2. Your physical
fearlessness is a strength. Please continue using your body in the world:
run, jump, climb, and throw. We love
watching you streaking down the road on your skateboard, or swimming proudly in the
pool, or chasing Bubba Jay around the house and then him chasing you back. There is both health and a sense of mastery
in physical activity and challenges.
3. You should never
be afraid to share your passions. If you are sometimes embarrassed that you
still like to play video games with dad, for example, or brush mom's hair and you worry that your friends
will make fun of you, don’t be. Anyone who
teases you for what you love to do is not a true friend. This is hard to realize, but essential.
4. It is okay to
disagree with me, and others. You are old enough to have a point of view,
and we want to hear it. So do those who
love you. Don't pick fights for the sake
of it, of course, but when you really feel mom or I are wrong, please say
so. You have heard me say that you are
right, and you've heard me apologize for my behavior or point of view when I
realize they were wrong, albeit sometimes not as soon as I should. Your
perspective is both valid and valuable.
Don't shy away from expressing it.
5. You are so very
beautiful. Your face now holds the baby you were and the young woman you
are rapidly becoming. My eyes and cheeks
and mom’s coloring combine into someone unique, someone purely you. I can see the dark clouds of society's beauty standards
hovering, manifest in your own growing self-consciousness. We beg of you not to lose sight with your own
beauty, so much of which comes from the fact that your spirit runs so close to
the surface.
6. Reading is
essential. It is the central
leisure-time joy of my life, as you know although I've been too long with a book in my hands.
Mom and I are immensely proud and pleased to see that you share
it. That identification you feel with
characters, that sense of slipping into another world, of getting lost there in
the best possible way. Those never go
away. Welcome.
7. You are not me.
We are very alike, but you are your own person, entirely, completely,
fully. We know this, I promise, even
when we lose sight of it. I know that
separation from both mom and I, are one of the fundamental tasks of your
adolescence, which I can see glinting over the horizon. I dread it like ice in my stomach, that
space, that distance, that essential cleaving, but I want you to know I know
how vital it is. Mom and I are going to
be here, no matter what, Drew. The red
string that ties us together will stretch.
I know it will. And once the
transition is accomplished there will be a new, even better closeness. I know that too.
8. It is almost never
about you. What I mean is that when people act in a way that hurts or makes
you feel insecure, it is almost certainly about something happening inside of
them, and not about you. I struggle with
this one horribly, and mom and I have tried very, very hard never once to tell you that
you are being "too sensitive" or to "get over it" when you
feel hurt. Believe me; I know how
feelings can slice your heart, even if your head knows otherwise. But maybe, just maybe, it will help to
remember that almost always other people are struggling with their own demons,
even if they bump into you by accident.
9. There is no single
person who can be your everything. Be very careful about bestowing this
power on any one person. I suspect you
are trying to fill a gnawing loneliness, and if you are, you inherited it from both mom and I. That feeling, Virginia Woolf's
"emptiness about the heart of life," is just part of the deal; a
conflict between community and independence.
Trying to fill that ache with other people (or with anything else, like
food, alcohol, numbing behaviors of a zillion sorts you don't even know of yet)
is a lost cause, and nobody will be up to the task. You will feel let down, and, worse, that
loneliness will be there no matter what.
I'm learning to embrace it, to accept it as part of who I am. I hope to help you do the same.
10. We are trying our
best. I know we’re not good enough
and not the father and mother you deserve.
We are impatient and fallible and raise our voices. We are sorry.
We love you more than anyone else in the entire world and we always wish
we could be better for you. I'll admit we
don't always love your behavior, and we’re quick to tell you that. But every single day, we love you with every
fiber of our being, no matter what. Never, ever forget this.
There are probably 10 more things. Hell maybe there are 20-40, but these are the most important for you now. We'll cross off the others as we get to them. For now, that's a "moo" point.
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