Read Chicken Soup for the Woman's Soul Online
Authors: Jack Canfield
Chicken Soup for the Woman's Soul (19 page)
Her life and mine would dramatically change now. She would be part of the world out there. I would have a harder time protecting her from the bumps and scrapes of life.
Perhaps I was being overprotective now because Cathy had been diagnosed at three as having a rare disease. No one but the family knew or even saw anything different about her.
I’m about to leave the kitchen to awaken Cathy for her big day. But here she comes, all bright eyes and smiles, dressed in a new red plaid skirt and blouse. She gives me a big hug as we say our good mornings.
“Good morning, you’re up early!” I greet her.
“Morning, Mom,” is mumbled into my apron because of her big hug. “See Mom, I got dressed all by myself and even brushed my hair.” She proudly twirls a pirouette to show me.
“But I can’t put this ribbon in my hair.” She hands me the brush, rubber band and red ribbon. I am amazed at how efficient she is this particular morning.
As I tend to her hair and ribbon, I ask her once more, “Would you like me to walk you to school this first day?”
I get the same answer as yesterday, “No, Mom, I can find my way all by myself. Renata, Leslie and I walked to the school yesterday and they showed me how to find the path through the woods right to the playground.
“And Mom, they have it all finished now and everything is brand new—the slide, swings and basketball hoops. It’s going to be great!”
My reply to her enthusiasm is, “Stand still so I can finish your hair ribbon.”
Then I gently push her toward the table. She quickly slides into her chair and attacks her breakfast. I turn back to the kitchen cupboards and take a deep breath, but it doesn’t melt the lump in my throat or dull the ache in my chest.
I glance at the clock. “You can’t leave before 8:30, so just slow down and chew your food.”
In a few minutes she has finished the last drop of milk. Without prompting, she goes off to brush her teeth and comes back with her sweater.
“Is it time to go now?” she pleads.
“When this hand reaches 6,” I point out to her on the clock.
I tentatively venture for the umpteenth time, “You’re sure you don’t want me to walk you to school?”
“No, Mom, I want to go alone.” She goes out onto the deck to call to the dog and check the back yard.
“Is it time now?” She is hopping up and down.
With a sigh, I say, “Yes, dear.”
I give her a big lingering hug, and off she races down the split-level stairs and out the front door. Standing at the top of our stairs, I can watch through the window. She is running down the sidewalk. Then suddenly she stops, turns and races back toward the house. “Oh, no,” I think, expecting to have to change out of slippers for a walk to school after all.
The front door bangs open and up the stairs she flies to throw her little arms around me and press her cheek into my tummy. The long tight hug ends as she turns her eyes up to mine and seriously proclaims, “You’ll be all right, Mom. I’ll be home at noon.”
Then off she dashes into her new world of school adventures, excited and happy to be graduating from babyhood. My misty eyes follow her progress to the end of our walk. She turns around again and waves to me. I wave back and find I can now smile.
The lump in my chest has melted as I think about her display of love. Yes, I will be all right as I go on to my own adventures. This is my graduation day, too.
Mary Ann Detzler
PEANUTS. Reprinted by permission of United Feature Syndicate, Inc.
A Mother’s Letter to the World
Dear World:
My son starts school today. It’s going to be strange and new to him for a while. And I wish you would sort of treat him gently.
You see, up to now, he’s been king of the roost. He’s been boss of the back yard. I have always been around to repair his wounds, and to soothe his feelings.
But now—things are going to be different.
This morning, he’s going to walk down the front steps, wave his hand and start on his great adventure that will probably include wars and tragedy and sorrow.
To live his life in the world he has to live in will require faith and love and courage.
So, World, I wish you would sort of take him by his young hand and teach him the things he will have to know. Teach him—but gently, if you can. Teach him that for every scoundrel there is a hero; that for every crooked politician there is a dedicated leader; that for every enemy there is a friend. Teach him the wonders of books.
Give him quiet time to ponder the eternal mystery of birds in the sky, bees in the sun, and flower son the green hill. Teach him it is far more honorable to fail than to cheat.
Teach him to have faith in his own ideas, even if everyone else tells him they are wrong. Teach him to sell his brawn and brains to the highest bidder, but never to put a price on his heart and soul.
Teach him to close his ears to a how ling mob ...and to stand and fight if he thinks he’s right.
Teach him gently,World,but don’t coddle him,because
only the test of fire makes fine steel.
This is a big order,World, but see what you can do. He’s
such a nice little fellow.
Author Unknown
You had your eyes open a little while ago, but now you just want to sleep. I wish you would open your eyes and look at me. My child, my precious, my angel sent from heaven... this will be the last time we are together. As I hold you close to me and feel your tiny body warm against my own, I look at you and look at you... I feel as if my eyes can’t hold enough of you. For a human being so small, there is a lot of you to look at ...in such a short time. In a few minutes, they will come and take you away from me. But for now, this is our time together and you belong to only me.
Your cheeks are still bruised from your birth—they feel so soft to my fingertip, like the wing of a butterfly. Your eyebrows are tightly clenched in concentration—are you dreaming? You have too many eyelashes to count and yet I want to engrave them all in my mind. I don’t want to forget anything about you. Is it all right that you are breathing so rapidly? I don’t know anything about babies—maybe I never will. But I know one thing for sure—I love you with all my heart. I love you so much and there is no way to tell you. I hope that someday you will understand. I am giving you away because I love you. I want you to have in your life all the things I could never have in mine—safety, compassion, joy and acceptance. I want you to be loved for who you are.
I wish I could squish you back inside of me—I’m not ready to let you go. If I could just hold you like this forever and never have to face tomorrow—would everything be all right? No, I know everything will only be all right if I let you go. I just didn’t expect to feel this way—I didn’t know you would be so beautiful and so perfect. I feel as if my heart is being pulled from my body right through my skin. I didn’t know I would feel so much pain.
Tomorrow your mom and dad are coming to the hospital to pick you up, and you will start your life. I pray that they will tell you about me. I hope they will know how brave I have been. I hope they will tell you how much I loved you because I won’t be around to tell you myself. I will cry every day somewhere inside of me because I will miss you so much. I hope I will see you again someday— but I want you to grow up to be strong and beautiful and to have everything you want. I want you to have a home and a family. I want you to have children of your own someday that are as beautiful as you are. I hope that you will try to understand and not be angry with me.
The nurse comes into the room and reaches out her arms for you. Do I have to let you go? I can feel your heart beating rapidly and you finally open your eyes. You look into my eyes with trust and innocence, and we lock hearts. I give you to the nurse. I feel as if I could die. Good-bye, my baby—a piece of my heart will be with you always and forever. I love you, I love you...I love you...
Patty Hansen
One day while in my early 30s, I sat in a Midwestern church and burst into tears. It was Mother’s Day, and ladies of all shapes and sizes, young and old, were being applauded by their families and the whole congregation. Each received a lovely rose and returned to the pews, where I sat empty-handed. Sorry to my soul, I was convinced I had missed my chance at that great adventure, that selective sorority called “motherhood.”
All that changed one February when, pushing 40 and pushing with all my might, I brought forth Gabriel Zacharias. It took 24 hours of labor for me to produce that little four-pound, eight-ounce bundle of joy. No wonder those ladies got flowers!
Any mother who has survived one birth amazes herself at her willingness to go for two. Jordan Raphael was born the following March. He was smaller and labor was shorter; but I still felt I deserved flowers.
The sorority I joined requires an extended hazing period: nine months of demanding cravings for unusual foods you can’t keep down; weight gain you can’t explain; a walk that is part buffalo and part duck; unique bedtime constructions of pillows designed to support this bulge and fill in that gap but avoid all pressure on the bladder; and extensive stretch marks culminating in excruciating labor pain.
With labor, the hazing period ends. But with the child’s birth, the initiation period in this great sorority has just begun. The painful tugs on the heart strings far exceed whatever physical pain labor required. There was my older son’s first cut that drew blood, his spiked fevers, his long bout with pneumonia; my younger son’s terror at a big barking dog, his near-miss with a car, the death of his pet rat.
While the hazing period may seem overlong, this initiation period never ends. I wake up when my sons cough. I hear their teddy bears land with a soft thud on the floor next to their beds. In the supermarket I respond to children calling “Mother!” and the kids, I realize, aren’t even my own!
I’ve advanced past bottle weaning, potty training, the first days of school and the first trip to the dentist. Coming up are first crushes, first heartbreaks, and first times behind the wheel of a car. I hope to someday see them each happily married with children of their own. Then I will gain entry into that even more exclusive sorority of “grandmotherhood.”
For now, the password to my heart is “Mom,” and I thank my sons for this. Especially on the days of their birth, happily on a special Sunday in May. My young sons do not yet realize how much I value this remarkable membership and won’t note it with flowers unless prompted. Yet every time we take a walk, they pluck me a short-stemmed blossom, “just because.”
This year I look forward to celebrating Mother’s Day— the divine achievement of the physical, the grand acceptance of the commonplace, the exquisite gratitude of watching my sons become uniquely themselves. Because of Gabriel and Jordan, I am a dues-paying, card-carrying member of The Club. Happy Mother’s Day to me!
Sharon Nicola Cramer
THE FAMILY
CIRCUS
“Poor Mommy. We get to go to the movies for Mother’s Day and she has to stay home.”
Reprinted with special permission of King Feature Syndicate, Inc.
T
oday a new sun rises for me; everything lives, everything is animated, everything seems to speak to me of my passion, everything invites me to cherish it...