a sweet promise.
A few nights ago my eleven year old son placed his hands on my face and put his forehead to mine and we closed our eyes. It was bedtime, and I was exhausted from the long day and equally long night trying to wrangle two spirited and energetic boys into their beds (will it ever be a simple task?!?!). The sweet tenderness of my sons touch calmed me into myself. I could feel us breathing together, harmonizing like a familiar song, and I was reminded of the time when we shared one set of lungs for breath. We sat there for a few minutes, me breathing him in, our foreheads connected, me thinking to myself how this moment right now is everything. It’s the sort of moment that makes all the challenges and hardships of parenting, and being a human, worth every ounce of energy it requires. All for this morsel of love and mystery and connection so deeply satisfying; like a puzzle we work our whole lives to solve and the missing piece just slips into place suddenly without any effort.
I wanted to bottle up the feeling and store it somewhere safe for when I am older and perhaps in need of such a loving gesture.
I whispered into his ear "will you still hold me like this when I am an old woman and you are a grown man?" To which my boy softly replied, " I promise."
I try to write down beautiful moments my children gift me. I keep notes on scrap paper and in journals and on the back of receipts, in hopes that someday I will stumble upon these treasures. These moments where something is felt beyond our understanding; some magic remembered, some force greater than our skin and bones and minds. A feeling which can only be experienced when we can block out all of the noise and crack open our hearts. We can call it love or presence or the universe or god, but sometimes it feels like there isn't quite the word to describe the way it feels.
But there it is, reminding us we are alive.
I crave to document the experiences that are so big our hearts care barely hold them. I want to bottle them up for you so that you can go back to them when you need it most. A note on the iphone or a scribble on the back of a receipt is a good start, but isn't it better to preserve these moments in the most beautiful way possible? I think so. The most incredible part is that in the process of making art we are living it. We are making the time and space for the connection that feeds our soul. There are many reasons to wait another year to make photos with the ones you love (life is so busy, i need to lose a few pounds) but baby teeth fall out and new ones grow in and curly hair straightens and the tiny hands on your cheeks are getting bigger by the day. The love is here now, waiting for you, and it won't be forever.
Let's create something to remember it with.
