The pain of teaching Evelyn letter writing is over. The days of prompting, asking her to sit up straight, of her scribbling letters too quickly—sloppy, performative, fishing for attention or comic relief—are gone. The hack, which has worked the past two mornings, is in effect.
In a wide-ruled notebook, I told her to write. First thing in the morning. Usually, she waits until after breakfast, so that request meant a sacrifice. “How will I play with my toys?” was exactly the response I expected. My newly sharpened parenting skills around discomfort and not liking something came in handy. I shrugged. “Sometimes we have to sacrifice.”
When she brought me her notebook, pride shining, I knew we were back on track. The letters were slower, deliberate. A full page—thirty or so words—evidence of time taken. And her reading it aloud to me was the cherry on top. She’d taken it from beginning to end and made it her own.
I love the handing over the keys part of parenting. I love seeing her succeed—like she’s learned to go the speed limit, get the oil changed, pay the insurance bill. If I had to choose one aspect of parenting, it’s that moment of “Here, take this,” knowing she might sink or swim, and then watching her arms pull through the water, seeing her surface, looking back at me with a thumbs-up from the other shore.
My least favorite part is the drop in my stomach that comes with it. The letting go. The small snips of the cords that bind her to needing me. And so I tell myself, just as I tell her: it’s okay to be uncomfortable. Parenting—growing—means toeing the edge of my comfort zone. And that’s okay. What other choice is there?
Writing has been, and I’m sure will continue to be, a great parenting resource. These moments of reflection—of success, of deep wells of sadness and loss—act as a release valve. Writing makes what I’m doing feel important. It shows me what matters.
Instead of life whizzing by in train-window slices, writing lets me take a picture. I hold it up and look closely. I notice the blur, the slight shake of the hand holding the camera. The mushroom just emerging in the background. The dew on thick blades of grass. I soak it in—the warmth, the promise—and I also feel the ache of knowing it won’t happen this way again. It joins the collection of never-will-be’s.
And I mourn. Like a widow in a drooping black veil, seated front and center at the funeral.
I step into both—the joy and the pain—and emerge whole. A wholeness that holds the extremes at once.
When I write this way, when I understand why the sharpened blade opens me for the page, I breathe easier. I cannot do this life without writing. It tethers then to now. It is how I cope with it all.
I don’t know how to live any other way.
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 