To my dear daughter,
When you were born, I couldn't envision the day that you would turn sixteen. You were so tiny and so new, that the thought of you as a teenager was unimaginable. Yet here we are a few days from your sixteenth birthday.
You have grown from such an adorable, quiet and shy little girl into a beautiful, engaging and articulate young woman. The tenacity that you show in accomplishing your goals is something that continues to amaze me. Your courage in facing adversity and the challenges that you encounter daily is nothing short of incredible.
The way that you so maturely handle the onerous task of trying to make others understand what sets you apart makes me so very proud of you.
I realized recently that you have been swimming against the tide since before you were even born. Due to some complications, during the last months of your "incubation" I was consumed with worry that you wouldn't survive to see this world. In true "Emily" nature though, not only did you survive but you were too impatient to even wait until the due date, thus arriving five weeks early. Thankfully, though you weighed all of five pounds, you were healthy, feisty and bossy right from the start.
From the first day, you slept and ate on your own schedule rather than the one that the baby books said you should (something you continue to do to this day). You reached the milestones well ahead of your time, and you constantly surprised everyone with your early accomplishments. Everything you did was exactly when you wanted to, never when we were expecting it, and always with a little streak of mischief and a lot of independence.
It's hard for me to look at you and not see the baby girl that gave my life such purpose. I still sneak in and watch you when you're sleeping (don't get creeped out - all mothers do this), and I still see the little girl with the blonde curls who just couldn't wait to be "growed up". Well, you're almost there and I'm still not ready.
I'm not ready for the boyfriend, not ready to see you behind the wheel of a car (and no, not mine) and I'm not ready to see you with a job. Then again, I wasn't ready to hear you talk, or walk or start school but those things all happened, and it turned out just fine.
I know that life isn't always a bed of roses when you're a teenager, but soon enough you'll be out of the teen years. High school will become a distant memory as you move on to other things. You'll have your ups and downs, and the downs will sometimes seem insurmountable. I can't tell you that will ever stop as you get older because life will continue to give you ups and downs. How you handle the downturns will help determine the outcome, so muster as much grace and courage as you can to get through them. You will welcome people into your life for many years to come, and you'll lose people as well. Friends and lovers will come and go. It will hurt at the time, but remember that when people leave you it isn't a reflection on you. All it means is that their place in your story has come to an end. It doesn't mean the story is over, just that a new chapter needs to be written.
So, write your story Emily. Fill it with as many chapters as you can, and as many pages as you can fit. Edit as necessary, review often. You may not have written the first few chapters by yourself, but you now have total control in how the rest of the story unfolds. Write it with passion, write it with pride and write it in purple because no one will expect that.
Happy birthday sweetheart, I love you to the moon and back.
No comments:
Post a Comment