Frances Friday: Four

You did it again, Frances; you grew another year older. Another year wiser and sweeter, and even a little bit bigger. Another year slimmer, your small self now taking on the contours of a young child instead of a baby, all traces of infant fat long since consumed. Your legs and arms are slim and muscular, your cheeks less rounded, your little shoulder blades moving visibly on your little back.

Beautiful girl, I am so head over heels in love with you. I have been since the moment you were born, your bitty baby self all folded in, short hair plastered to your scalp, huge dark blue eyes wide with shock. Placed in my arms in a little pink blankie just for a moment before the nurses whisked you off to help you breathe in the NICU. Maybe that's why I love you so intensely; because I had you and then you were taken away and I could sense the shape and size of the hole you left. I've never been able to take you for granted. I can't know if that's what made it different, or even if it's different at all. All I do know is, you are still my reason for living.

A day is coming when you won't thank me for it (maybe in thirty, forty years?), but right now you and I make a good pair.

There are things I can recall now, but only incredulously; like, when you were born, I could cover your torso with my hand. I could carry you with your head in the crook of my elbow and your feet in my palm, one-armed; I could envelop one of your feet with my hand. There was a time when you were too small for the baby bjorn. Where did this girl come from? This brave, resilient, clever little girl? Who jumps up and says "I have to go to the bathroom" while running off, to take down her own pants and put up the lid of the potty before I've even caught up long enough to turn on the light? Who goes to the TV cabinet and picks out a dvd to watch, opens the case, takes out whatever is in the dvd player, puts in the new one, and turns on the tv, all by herself? Who puts on her own boots and her own coat? Did you know I used to change your diapers? How is it that seems so incredible? Did you know I used to have to dress you in onesies that snapped up the front because you hated to have shirts pulled over your head, and you would lie there on your back with your arms and legs in non-stop motion, and I would have to do it all myself? You used to be a baby.

Shouldn't this be obvious? Intellectually I suppose it is, but it never means the same thing when it happens to you; and I find myself, these days, sometimes looking at people on the streets and thinking--"they used to be a baby!" and imagining them that way, their own mothers carefully dressing them, holding them and feeding them. We all began as these helpless little bundles of need. Most of us don't become Frances, though.

I am the world's luckiest mom. No one else gets to have you as their daughter, and you are as close to perfect, I think, as a person can be. I love it when we sit side-by-side and compare our pinkie fingers, or you pull on a pair of my socks and they go almost all the way up to your hips, or you go clump-clumping around the house in a pair of my flats. I love it when you ask me how to draw something, and when I try it, you say, "No! That's not how you draw it! I'll show you." Then you take the marker or crayon out of my hands and proceed to instruct me. "I see," I say. "That is pretty good." "Yeah," you say. "That's how you draw it."

You draw! I love to watch you drawing. You draw dragons and dinosaurs, with scaly backs, sharp teeth, eyes and noses and claws, bodies and legs. You draw bunnies with big ears. You draw persons (and I love it that you call them persons, and not people). You even draw snacks complete with cups of juice, though I'm not sure what makes them cups of juice. No offense. Your dragons are excellent.

And you do like to educate me. "Skeletons don't blink," you say; or "Witches can't pee." (I'm still waiting for you to give me permission again and my bladder is getting very full, so can we follow up on that conversation soon?) "Maybe toy birdies can't talk," you will say, directly before they all have an involved conversation about who is whose Mummy and who is whose brother and who doesn't have a Mummy or a Daddy and is very sad, so will fly around crying for help until someone helps them. "Persons have skeletons," you will tell me; "and muscles, and organs, and skin! The muscles and the organs are on the inside." And "A T Rex is a dinosaur, and he is big and mean and he eats other little dinosaurs!"

Despite your bloodthirsty glee with dinosaurs currently, you still have a mammoth heart (it must be where all of your calories are going). Last weekend you took it into your head to make C a Christmas card, and after having plastered a piece of cardstock with a couple dozen snowman stickers (very artfully arranged, all holding hands--er, twigs), walked around in a glow, saying, "I made this for my sister. I think she'll really like it." She did, too.

You are a great kid, Frances McBean. There are times when I sit in that apartment and stare at the (yellow) walls and feel like I am losing my mind; but five minutes of you sitting on my lap with your two broomhandle arms wrapped around mine and everything seems ok. That's not your job, kiddo. It's not your job to make your Mummy feel better, but you do, just by being your sweet, snuggly, clever, funny, bright-eyed, soft-haired, perpetual-motioned, brave, smiling little self. I don't rely on you for it, but I take it when I can. You make me smile.

I try to make you smile too. This has been such a hard year for you. You lost your home, your friends, you started school and a new daycare, you moved to a new neighbourhood, and your family fell apart. You took it all in stride, strong little girl that you are, but I know you miss your daddy terribly. You tell me so, every day, that you miss him and you want to see him. I know what you really want is to see both of us--you see me so much you don't get a chance to miss me. I wish I could fix this for you. I hate that I had to do this to you, Frances Bean. You are still just a little girl and you shouldn't have to deal with so many big, scary changes. The kinds of changes that many adults find difficult and overwhelming. Believe me, I don't forget it. I don't forget how much you've lost, and I don't forget that it was my choice, because I believed this would be better for you as well as me, and I take that very seriously--that I will make this better for you as well as me. I can't make you stop missing your Daddy--and I wouldn't, even if I could, because I want you to love each other and have the close relationship you now do forever--but hopefully I can offer you happiness and love and security enough to compensate you for it. I hope this is the hardest birthday you will have for many, many, many years.

In the meantime--dear girl, you will be four years old tomorrow. Four fabulous years. I am still waiting for your first temper tantrum.

Now I have to duck, while all the other moms throw rotten tomatoes at me. But it's not my fault you're so close to perfect.

I'm not biased, either.

I love you, sweet girl. You are my favourite person, ever.

Posted by Andrea at December 21, 2007 6:47 AM under Frances Friday

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