And Now You Are Eleven
March 26, 2010
This morning when I woke you up for school, you were stretched out on your bed. Your eyes still closed, you asked me if you born yet. No, you were on your way, but it would be many hours before you would finally make your entrance. You sighed deeply and said, Well I am really still only ten then.
I assured you that you get the entire day to celebrate, regardless of what time of day you were born. You opened one eye and looked skeptically at me. I gave birth to you, I get to make the rules, I told you.
You smiled, with those dimples so deep my heart falls right into them. Then I sang you my rousing rendition of Happy Birthday. The you-look-like-a-monkey version of which children are still fond.
I mean LOOK at your dimples? It is a miracle I did not eat you as a toddler.
*****
You wouldn’t be born until 11pm. You were the longest labor I have ever endured. It was mentally and emotionally exhausting. I felt sure that I would be pregnant and in the hospital forever. Forever in labor. A special circle of Hell that Dante forgot to mention, being a man and all.
I don’t recall much about your early days. Having four boys aged four and under will do that to a person. But you stole my heart. I do remember that you were an easy going baby. You never cried. You never complained. And you smiled all the time. You still have that same easy going personality.
*****
Yesterday you decided to mark your exit from the first decade of your life by dropping the F-bomb at school. You decided to tell someone to f— themself. Deservedly so. I wish you had made better word choices. That was what we discussed when you arrived home from school. Telling someone to f— themself is lazy and for people who have no imagination. It is a word that relies solely on its shock value. You are better than that. We then discussed alternative things you could have said.
The principal, when she called, told me not to worry, that in her experience kids with teenage siblings learn these words. I think she was just trying to make me feel better.
Not that she needed to, because I NEVER say that word.
But the more I think about it, I have decided I am blaming Joe Biden.
I tried not to laugh on the phone. Not because I think it is funny, I don’t think it is, but because it is so completely out of character for you to say anything like that. I don’t think I have ever heard you swear. You rarely get angry enough at anything to well, actually get angry. You laugh most things off. But things are always brewing with the crazy neighbor-bully children and it was inevitable that you would blow up. Personally, I am glad that you didn’t punch the kid in the nose. I don’t think I could have blamed Joe Biden for that one.
The thing is, when you are an adult you will run across people like this child from time to time. How you react to them shows as much about you as it does about them. That’s where a sense of humor comes in.
The fact that you began refering to your lunch detention you had to have with the principal today as your “birthday lunch date” assures me that you are going to be just fine.
*****
I wrote you a note that I placed in your lunchbox today. Eleven things I love about you. The last thing on the list, number 11, was that I am so happy that you are my son and that I secretly believe all the mothers in the world are missing out, because I got the best one.
And I believe that. This past decade being your mother has been an honor. I have watched you grow from a tiny helpless baby. I have delighted in all your accomplishments. I think about the next decade of your life, one where you will be moving further and further away from me. One where you will need me less and less. My role in your life will be to step ever-so-slowly backwards.
I will watch as you navigate new friendships, fall in love, more than likely have your heart broken. I will watch from afar as other people play larger parts in your life. Days will pass where we will not see each other or talk. And that is how it should be. My job as your mother is to raise you to leave me.
What other kind of job is there like this? Nine months of having your body stretched physically to it’s very limit. A life time of endless worry and crossed legged sneezing. Lack of sleep. Exhaustion. In exchange for a love so deep it breaks you heart. Oh, what the hell, sign me up. Again and again. (And again and again and again and again and again. Man, I am exhausted just typing that.)
That you leave me and have your own loves and your own life will be the measure of my success. And I am okay with that. Mostly.
But I want you to know that when I sit next to you on the couch at night, or we curl up in my bed reading together, when I brush your hair out of your eyes and kiss your cheek, it is still the same cheek I kissed all those years ago. You sometimes are annoyed by me and you want me to stop looking at you, stop kissing you, and for the love of God stop tucking you hair behind your ear. But to me you haven’t really changed. You will always be my angel haired baby. Even with the potty mouth.
Happy Birthday. I love you.
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Oh, you have done it AGAIN, I should know better and grab the tissues BEFORE I read these birthday posts!
March 26th, 2010 at 6:56 amHappy birthday, Blond One!
March 26th, 2010 at 7:06 amOh my God, thats lovely. I just dropped off my youngest at Playschool for a trial morning and my heart is broke, just knowing this is the last time I will ever do that kills me.
March 26th, 2010 at 7:09 amHappy birthday to your handsome boy.
To quote John Lennon, Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, boy! Chris lovely heartfelt words that made me tear this morning.
I have a nephew/godson that has these same dimples. How do you suppose God decides who to gift with these little indentions of loveliness?
March 26th, 2010 at 7:30 amI LOVED the post!!! Another great one with humor, sentimental and just plain beautiful! He looks like Miles for sure with those dimples! Happy Birthday to your son!
March 26th, 2010 at 7:31 amHappy Birthday #4…I will forever remember you at the ripe old age of 4 flying like a Bat out of Hell down my backyard on a bicycle and crashing into a tree! While I was picking my heart up off the ground, you bounced right up again laughing hysterically…Hard to believe I know.
Chris says: Hahahaha. I remember that. I think you made us leave your house…
March 26th, 2010 at 7:44 amAnd now I am crying.
That was lovely. Happy Birthday, dude.
March 26th, 2010 at 7:45 amAwww, Happy Birthday, as usual a great letter
I was hoping things were better with the neighbors or at least quiet, sorry to hear they are not.
March 26th, 2010 at 7:55 amBeautiful!
I have tears in my eyes, thinking about my boys, 3 here and one in Heaven. Of how time passes and how much we love our kids and ultimately have to let them go.
isaida
March 26th, 2010 at 7:56 amWow. *Sob!* :*( … off to hug my teens.
March 26th, 2010 at 8:07 amI should’ve waited to put my mascara on this morning. Awesome post.
March 26th, 2010 at 8:27 amThese are the things that are important.
March 26th, 2010 at 8:40 amYou’ve got great kids. But I think they have a VERY special mom…
March 26th, 2010 at 8:44 amHappy birthday to Mr. Congeniality! I hope he enjoys his lunch date today.
March 26th, 2010 at 8:46 amYou write so well I want to plagerize and use a lot of the same lines on my children. Especially the one where you say that the other mothers lost out because you got the best. My first reaction was no she didn’t - I did;) Thank you for sharing and happy birthday to #4!
March 26th, 2010 at 8:47 amAbsolutely beautiful. Happy Birthday!
March 26th, 2010 at 9:21 amWhat a lovely birthday tribute. Hope he has a great day, even with his special “lunch date.” (That sense of humor will take him far in life.) And the dimples? I have a 1yo son with similar cheeks — he has almost been eaten as well.
March 26th, 2010 at 9:25 amWhat a sweet post. It’s also my 3 year old son’s birthday today too. He too has dimples you could swim in.
March 26th, 2010 at 9:27 amChris - wow. Your bday posts to your children could be published in a book. Really moving. Happy birthday to your boy!
March 26th, 2010 at 9:41 amI have to stop reading your blog at work, people are beginning to look at me funny because I am either laughing hysterically out loud or sobbing (and often both at the same time). It’s amazing how you put what every mommy feels into such eloquent words. Happy Birthday to your 11 year old!
March 26th, 2010 at 9:44 amHeartbreakingly touching. I need to copy some of those words to hang on the wall. They perfectly describe motherhood. Thank you for reminding me why I signed up for it again and again, and again, and so on.
March 26th, 2010 at 9:44 amBeautiful - I really shouldn’t read these posts at work - tears aren’t very professional.
March 26th, 2010 at 9:58 amWell, I’m all teary now. Beautifully written.
March 26th, 2010 at 9:59 amYou write the best and I mean “the best” letters to your children on their birthdays. You should put them all in a book not just for them but for the rest of us who are unable to put these emotions down on paper. Oh yeah and could they get any cuter?
March 26th, 2010 at 10:01 amI agree with Keri - I was trying to find something meaningful to say but instead, I agree with Keri. Put all these notes together and make an anthology. I have absolutely no doubt you could sell it.
March 26th, 2010 at 10:16 am“Birthday lunch date”? That is amazingly awesome. I think it shows what a great mom he has, too. Happy Birthday, dude!
March 26th, 2010 at 10:17 amI wish I’d been writing letters like this to my kids. Guess it’s not too late to start, they’re only 6 and 8… So beautiful and such a tribute to being a mother who’s got it right in her head. This job is hard, but I need to remind myself to have this kind of attitude more often, especially when they drop the F-bomb.
March 26th, 2010 at 10:20 amHappy Birthday!
March 26th, 2010 at 10:22 amugh…now i’m crying at my desk…this was beautiful…thanks Chris
March 26th, 2010 at 10:23 amI blame Joe Biden also.
My exceedingly mild-mannered husband relates that he once punched a kid in the nose on the school bus. The kid finally pushed him too far, is all. And when the kid’s mother complained? My future father-in-law told her that her son got what he deserved.
A different world, back then…
March 26th, 2010 at 10:36 amA beautiful post, by the way…I can never write birthday posts like that.
March 26th, 2010 at 10:36 amBeautiful!! I hope he has a great birthday!
March 26th, 2010 at 10:45 amTears flowing again. Thank you for sharing
HAPPY BIRTH-DAY
March 26th, 2010 at 10:56 amThat was so beautiful. Your kids are so lucky to have you for a mom. I have to say that my son, who will be 11 in June, absolutely loves your boys haircuts. He wanted me to print out a picture of them to take to the Barber Shop so they could see how he wants to grow his hair.
March 26th, 2010 at 11:23 amOh man the lump in my throat and tears in my eyes while reading that…my first child is 6 months old, and I think about these things you talk about-with his whole life ahead of him…and how it’s going to feel, how it’s going to hurt, how joyous, painful, funny, sad, it will all be. I never knew how profound love could be until 6 months ago. Thanks for sharing.
March 26th, 2010 at 11:23 amOkay now I am crying into my coffee. So beautiful!
March 26th, 2010 at 11:33 amWow. This seriously made me shed a tear. Just beautiful!
Do you show your kids these letters or will you wait until they are older? I wish I could write letters like these for my kids’ birthdays, but I don’t have a way with words like you. I hope your children treasure these beautiful birthday letters from their Mum forever.
Happy 11th birthday to your middle child!
March 26th, 2010 at 11:41 amTears, beautiful post! and I love the birthday lunch date humor. = )
March 26th, 2010 at 11:59 amWhat a lovely birthday tribute -happy birthday to your son.
I love the way you handled the discussion about your son using the F word i.e. that it is lazy and for people with no imagination. And that you then discussed all the things he could have said instead. That was wonderfully handled and I am going to use those exact words and approach when the time comes with my daughter, which I know it will one day only I hope not for a while yet as she is only three
Have a fabulous day celebrating with your son
I do so like your posts
March 26th, 2010 at 12:00 pmHappy Birthday to the eleven year old boy! I have a son just a year younger than your blondie and I’m feeling the same way. It’s hard to watch them pull away, but really be mama’s boys at heart. You’ve been doing this longer than I have so I feel like I’m learning from you with this whole boy thing. They’re interesting creatures! You have 4 more kids than me, but we’re in the same motherhood stage. I’ve got a “baby” going to Kindergarten in the fall. It seems like yesterday when he was born. Too fast this thing called life.
Enjoy your weekend!
March 26th, 2010 at 12:07 pmGreat post! My daughter shares your son’s birthday, and she too turns eleven today!
You’re so much more eloquent than I am, and timely too. My daughter’s birthday post isn’t going up until later tonight. May I use the “11 things I love about you” idea?
Happy Birthday to your son. He’s beautiful, just like the rest of your family!
March 26th, 2010 at 12:26 pmHow lovely. Won’t you just love it when you hit thirty or be gifted with your first baby to find a letter like this from your mom? It’d make so much more sense than when you first read it, and it’ll be heart-wrenching.
March 26th, 2010 at 12:29 pmMy blonde boy is 18 (?!) today. It hasn’t been easy and while he does have a great sense of humor, it’s often hard to find under all the teen angst. (Actually, eleven was when he started his downward slide! Yikes!) And though I love him like crazy, I am looking forward to his adult years. Off to bake his cake now. Happy birthday to yours and mine!
March 26th, 2010 at 12:29 pmWow, this is so beautiful. Could I just steal it when my son gets a little older? j/k of course!
Happy birthday to your son!
March 26th, 2010 at 12:30 pmBeautiful post. I never realized how much your 11 year old looks like Miles! Hope your son had a wonderful day.
March 26th, 2010 at 12:38 pmNow I know exactly what Miles is going to look like when he’s 11
March 26th, 2010 at 1:22 pmHappy Birthday to your gorgeous boy, have fun beating back the girls with a big stick when he hits the teens…two short years away….;-)
Happy Birthday to your handsome son! And you are right — he has a great sense of humor. Plus, Mmmmm. Dimples.
March 26th, 2010 at 1:29 pmTeary eyed, and then laughing hysterically over the Biden joke. Thanks.
March 26th, 2010 at 1:44 pmCrying now… my middle turns 10 next week. Sigh.
And what is it with kids & the time of their birth? It seems universal now, though I never thought about it as a kid. In fact, I am convinced my parents didn’t even remember what time I was born!
March 26th, 2010 at 1:46 pmI come here for these posts, from a women who loves her children so much. I come for the love and the pride and the humor and the ‘f’ bomb. I come to be reassured that others can’t stop laughing at their children either. That even when I am trying to be the parent, I’m delighting in creativity and the personality and the ‘how did I produce you?”.
I tire of the burden of motherhood conversations. I tire of how will I spend all of spring break home with my children i’ll go crazy conversation. I live for those breaks, that come further and further apart.
I come to read about a mom who adores her children, thinks they’re hilarious, sometimes is dissappointed, knows it will be hard to watch them leave, but that is the job of a mother. I too would sign up for it over and over again. It is my favorite thing.
And that’s coming from someone who just cleaned up puke off a little boy, then washed his carseat. I would do it again even for those moments.
March 26th, 2010 at 1:58 pmOK, I’m crying. It’s amazing how much he looks like Miles. Beautiful post.
March 26th, 2010 at 1:58 pmHappy Birthday to your dear dimpled son (of many dimpled children
) I am glad to know I am not the only one that lets her son(s) wear their hair long if they want…but continually attempts to tuck it behind their ears (hey, I’ve no girls!)
Happiest Year to you both!!
March 26th, 2010 at 2:03 pm(I am a F bomb dropper…and you’re right it IS lazy. I use it only on one person ~ I need to find better words to communicate with! :D)
Sweet. I love being a mom. I can tell you do too! Happy birthday!
March 26th, 2010 at 2:26 pmBeautiful, beautiful letter. Happy birthday to your angel-haired eleven year old!
March 26th, 2010 at 2:55 pmHAPPY BIRTHDAY !!!
March 26th, 2010 at 3:00 pm“birthday lunch date” - that’s just awesome!
March 26th, 2010 at 3:41 pmThat is so beautiful and so typical of you to write it, I almost don’t know what to say. What you say is what we all feel and don’t know HOW to say. Even when my kids are older that you are today, I feel the same to them. To me they are still my babies, all grown up but when I look in their eyes, or see their smiles they are still my little ones. We are mothers forever.
March 26th, 2010 at 3:56 pmThank you for putting it so well.
He is pretty f-ing awesome!
March 26th, 2010 at 4:01 pmA fantastic letter…makes me think I’d like to start writing birthday letters to my twins. Thanks for the inspiration. And happy “birth” day to you.
March 26th, 2010 at 4:14 pmCan’t see through the tears. Very sweet!
March 26th, 2010 at 4:14 pmYou will be the dreamiest of all dreamy mothers in law one day, ya know why?
“My job as your mother is to raise you to leave me.”
That’s why.
March 26th, 2010 at 4:21 pmI needed a tissue warning on this one. Your phrases “My job as a mother is to raise you to leave me” and “But I want you to know that when I sit next to you on the couch at night, or we curl up in my bed reading together, when I brush your hair out of your eyes and kiss your cheek, it is still the same cheek I kissed all those years ago” are just beautiful. I hope your son printed this note out to keep with him always.
March 26th, 2010 at 4:56 pmYour birthday posts are my very favorite…always love when I come to your site and it is a bday post…and since you have 7 throughout the year, we get to enjoy them several times a year…YAY!
My 16 year old, who is much like your now 11 year old, is easy going too. In all his 11 years in school, I have never gotten a bad report on him…a few weeks ago we were informed that he called one of his teachers an asshole…to his face…same as your son, he holds this stuff in check…my husband and I had a good laugh in private and then cussed him out ;o)…not really, but I can’t imagine where he has heard such??? Thankfully, the teachers/coaches kept it to themselves so that he didn’t get a disciplinary mark…but, he ran his butt off at practice that evening and then he had to “self report” his lapse in judgement to us…that was the worst punishment EVER!
I laughed and cried at this post…as college looms so close, I had to steal some of your letter to use as inspiration next year…thank you for being you…love this site…
March 26th, 2010 at 5:31 pmWow…your birthday posts always make me weepy. Nicely done.
I do have 2 questions:
March 26th, 2010 at 5:39 pm1. Is Miles just a #4 clone?
2. Are your boys playing chinese jumprope in picture 4? I LOVE chinese jumprope…but you never see it anymore.
Happy birthday to Kate’s cyber twin ^^
You are way more organized than I am, I barely wrote about Cees’s birthday , which was in November, yes.
And Kate also insisted she was still 10 till the moment of her birth.
Karen
March 26th, 2010 at 7:42 pmThose dimples… so cute! Love the pic of him as a toddler standing on a stone wall. Hope he had a great “birthday lunch date.” Too funny!
March 26th, 2010 at 7:43 pmThis part of your post hit home — “I will watch as you navigate new friendships, fall in love, more than likely have your heart broken. I will watch from afar as other people play larger parts in your life. Days will pass where we will not see each other or talk. And that is how it should be. My job as your mother is to raise you to leave me.”
March 26th, 2010 at 8:49 pmMy son is a senior in college and my daughter just got her driver’s license this week….. Keep them close as long as you can.
I could so relate to this, we are moving my 19 year old college student back in tonight because “she needs me”. I’m ok with this she is working and going to school, but oh my at the trying to step back.
He is simply adorable (I LOVE dimples!!!!!) Happy Birthday!
March 26th, 2010 at 10:33 pmBeautiful, Chris. My middle boy turned 11 today too. I wish I had thought of sending a list of 11 things I love about him in his lunchbox today. We still homeschool though. If I had read this YESTERDAY I could have thought of a way to modify that special way of honoring his day.
Thank you for reminding me to appreciate my 3 boys. You have a lot more on your plate than I do and I often don’t appreciate my life.
March 26th, 2010 at 11:06 pmGorgeous. In every way.
March 26th, 2010 at 11:46 pmI love your 11 reasons I love you idea! We are in birthday season (4 kids). First one of the season was last week, she turned 9–easy, peasy. Monday, my oldest will be 20. I will start in the morning. This one will be harder, still dealing with teenage crap and all. Thank you. Love your blog!
March 27th, 2010 at 2:02 amHe definitely has the best hair of all your boys.
March 27th, 2010 at 3:00 amLove the birthday posts! 2 of my 4 children were born late in the evening in California and we now live in Europe - 9 time zones away - the older siblings often tease that their ‘real’ birthday is actually the next day! Doesn’t always go over so well with the 2 littles.
March 27th, 2010 at 7:20 amHappy Belated Birthday to the best son…!
March 27th, 2010 at 8:36 amBeautiful!
March 27th, 2010 at 9:35 amThe love you have for your children is just saturating this post. Thank you so much for sharing. Happy Birthday to Miles’ older twin!!
March 27th, 2010 at 5:09 pmWhat an ador.a.ble CUBBIE! Beautifully written…
March 27th, 2010 at 6:26 pmSublime.
March 27th, 2010 at 11:58 pmWhatever. I’ll have you know that I got the best ones.
Chris says: That’s what they all say.
March 28th, 2010 at 3:07 pmYou write the most amazing birthday posts for your children! I am moved to tears with each one.
As lucky as you are to have your kids they are lucky to have you for their mother!
March 28th, 2010 at 7:06 pmLovely! My oldest will turn double-digits in a couple of months…only 6 years away from driving!(as he keeps reminding me…Lord help us all) Where does the time go?
As a total aside, where did you find the chinese jump rope your boys are playing with in the 4th photo? I’ve been looking all over for one for my kids and Toys R’ Us doesn’t even have them!!!
Chris says: My neighbor made it by looping elastic bands together.
March 29th, 2010 at 11:03 amThis post is something he will treasure…sometime in the future…beautiful
March 29th, 2010 at 12:28 pmHis dimples do get me every time. ANd his sense of humor. I’m surprised he didn’t use both to get out of his “lunch date!”
March 29th, 2010 at 3:47 pmI just found my way to your blog and am in love with it. I have two little ones and the parenting tidbits you write inspire me and make me want to store them for when I’ll need them!
March 30th, 2010 at 12:40 pmHappy Birthday, Dimples!
April 1st, 2010 at 2:52 pmI pink puffy heart your little guy! In a not creepy way. I am a mom of an eleven year old also….so see, NOT creepy!
Birthday lunch date is so stinkin cute and hilarious all wrapped up in one awesome, adorable guy!
Happy Birthday guy!
April 1st, 2010 at 2:53 pmyour posts make me look forward to the day when i get to be a mother and share in the joy of motherhood. of course i still hope that day is more than a few years away…
April 2nd, 2010 at 12:58 pm