To Everything There Is A Season..
Posted 05-09-2007 at 01:28 AM by chettasmom
When I was in high school,my English Teacher, Mrs. Galvin encouraged us to make a list. Not just any list, but a list of all our "wants" for the years to come..myself, like any self respecting high school girl, naturally included the usual frivolties such as "have a great tan, get skinny and show up at the 10 year reunion to smite all those evil cheerleaders who have now gained weight and look like hell, marry a gorgeous blond body builder, and have tons of money." ..A decade after that original list was created, I tried to relax with a notebook and pen, as the sun went down on a lovely summer evening, legs swollen to the bursting point from pregnancy gone so toxic that the very mention of any type of salt would make cause my rings to tighten and make my fingers look like fat little sausages, and I wondered if the cheerleaders were experiencing the same thing as me. I wondered if Mrs. Galvin was still the same porcelained skin beauty that she was back then-making 9th grade boys blush under their acne skinned faces..and I thought about that list. Was I really so shallow back then that I only longed for a good tan and vengence on a group of girls that never even uttered a word of kindness to me for those 4 long years of drudgery called high school?
As I glanced at the faded sheet of loose leaf paper that held those dreams and wishes of teenage years gone by, I realized it was time to let go of the past and create a new, more true list, that reflected the woman-soon-to-be mother that I now was...My wish for that good looking blond, had turned to good wishes for my short, scottish, stocky built highlander husband, and my longing for a good tan had transformed to wishes for the elasticity of my belly to bounce back, post natally without those shiny pink marks of a baby growing wild inside me. I wished that wish that all expectant moms long for..not a girl, nor a boy, but for a healthy infant, with all ten toes and fingers, and hopefully a curl or two of dark thick soft hair on its' head...
This past sunday, as I awoke to the sound of that beautiful baby, now grown into a strong, thin,Tan,gorgeous woman, soon to be married herself, and her tall handsome fiance, outside laughing in the yard as they raked out the garden beds, and planted flowers as an early surprise for me for Mothers Day. My memory drifted back at that list I had created, edited, and re-edited year after year, and I realized that my daughter, was everything I had wanted to be..and wasn't even aware of her tremendous strength she had given me through the years..
Later that night as we talked, and she worried about her own future, I gave her the same advice that Mrs. Galvin had once given me.."to Everything There is a Season.." As she looked at me with a slightly puzzled gaze, I realized that the only way she would truly understand what this meant was to have her make a list of her own...so that she, like me, would change as the seasons do..year after year, slightly different but always the same..and just then, the tan, the cheerleaders, and those stretch marks all faded away...
As I glanced at the faded sheet of loose leaf paper that held those dreams and wishes of teenage years gone by, I realized it was time to let go of the past and create a new, more true list, that reflected the woman-soon-to-be mother that I now was...My wish for that good looking blond, had turned to good wishes for my short, scottish, stocky built highlander husband, and my longing for a good tan had transformed to wishes for the elasticity of my belly to bounce back, post natally without those shiny pink marks of a baby growing wild inside me. I wished that wish that all expectant moms long for..not a girl, nor a boy, but for a healthy infant, with all ten toes and fingers, and hopefully a curl or two of dark thick soft hair on its' head...
This past sunday, as I awoke to the sound of that beautiful baby, now grown into a strong, thin,Tan,gorgeous woman, soon to be married herself, and her tall handsome fiance, outside laughing in the yard as they raked out the garden beds, and planted flowers as an early surprise for me for Mothers Day. My memory drifted back at that list I had created, edited, and re-edited year after year, and I realized that my daughter, was everything I had wanted to be..and wasn't even aware of her tremendous strength she had given me through the years..
Later that night as we talked, and she worried about her own future, I gave her the same advice that Mrs. Galvin had once given me.."to Everything There is a Season.." As she looked at me with a slightly puzzled gaze, I realized that the only way she would truly understand what this meant was to have her make a list of her own...so that she, like me, would change as the seasons do..year after year, slightly different but always the same..and just then, the tan, the cheerleaders, and those stretch marks all faded away...
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