Tuesday Jan 21st 9AM
I noticed a change yesterday in his usual motion when attempting to turn the pages of the board books we read. He has favorite books, and it’s as if he finds and selects them specifically each day, holding them up to me (meaning: help me use this), no matter where they are hidden on the shelves. He loves all the books about color, and the ones that inspire a song (Ring-around-the-Rosie).
And the change that I’ve noticed is undoubtedly an increase in the most boundless character trait: Grace. His fingertips feel for each page before turning it over, caressing now rather than grabbing, and less rapidly, with more care. He murmurs to himself as he does so. It seems - and it’s strange and funny to realize that it seems so because it is so - that he is gaining consciousness, waking up, becoming alive, and developing unique eccentricities; I see a personality! Could it be that the brightness of one's personality is connected to one's tendency to gracefulness?
In twenty-seven years I’ve never once been entirely graceful. Over the past year I may have been less graceful than ever before. Parenthood is difficult, it was accurately said. You won’t know until you’re in it. This last has never rang more true. I have learned, if nothing else, that salvation lies in optimism. We are no more and no less than what we say we are. We have in our hands exactly that which we hold in our hearts. Like the old adage regarding the ability to pick oneself up after a fall, the deciding factor in the race may not be the starting gun or the final stretch, but the moments in between where perspective seems to be lost, and giving up seems to be entirely acceptable. To remember exactly why we do everything that we do, and to see in our mind’s eye a little more of the big picture, can (and has) made all the difference in persistence. I will take this moment to thank all the people in my life that have helped me keep (or regain) my perspective when I need it most. You know who you are.
And separately, I will take a moment to praise my partner, my champion unparalleled; an exemplar of motherhood; passionate and instinctual. Things are not easy! But Dayna Marie, I thank you for everything that you are. All is as it is meant to be. I believe in us, through everything. There are no coincidences, and we will never stop looking for them. We will continue to do our best to achieve our vision of serene happiness, and our best will only continue to get better with time. Together, we shall seek and find infinite grace. Learning and growing toward the sun like a vine sewing endless seeds of heady wine, I cherish your poetic beauty with all my heart; it means everything to me. Don’t ever stop leaving me notes. I love you. After this Sunday (1/26/20) we can start planning our October 2021 ceremony of marriage. Our journey has only begun.
Roland will be one year old in just a few days, and these experiences that will surely never be able to be called memories from his perspective are nonetheless shaping him; the decisions he incoherently and unknowingly makes are the results of his surroundings, giving me ponder each day into the amount of time we give to thinking about the purpose of our own actions. Are our actions based on our idea of true happiness? For Roland the answer is yes, and in this moment, that is what I admire most about him.