My Teeny Tiny,

I have written about you and what is has been like to be your mother, but I haven’t written to you. You. My baby. The apple of my eye. You child, you made me who I am. You child, you are why I am always trying harder to make something of my life. It is never for the glory of my life, I can easily get by with Ramen and water. You though, you my child, you make me want to make so much more of who I am. And you have done this since you were smaller than a grape. The mere idea of you being in this world changed who I was and who I thought I wanted to be. Before you even were visible, you had changed lives. You had this world by the lapels before you came into it. That is you and who you are and who you were meant to be; You were born to change this place.

I will never forget the first time I saw your face…Not even your face. The first time I looked into you eyes, I lost who I was and I became your Mom. It was worth the exchange and worth the wait for it to happen.

The first time I hear you cry, I cried. That first laugh you belted, that laugh, made me see that life before you was not even close to what fun could be. You were going to be, and have since been, the best adventure of my life. Your voice alone, the sound of you now, makes me feel grounded and in place.

You will never know how much you make me happy to be alive. If I had done nothing else on this planet, I made you. And you are the best thing I have done. Because of you, I got ot be a mom. But not only that, I got to be your mom.

No one in this world has changed my life, the way you’ve done.

No matter what happens now, I am your mom.

Come hell or high water, you can count on me.

You cannot lose me.

I will always be your soft place to fall.

Looking at you today, I am beside myself that you came from me. You are so far beyond who I was as a teenager.

I keep watching you grow up and I want to slow time down. I want you to stay small. Stay ‘Man Cub’, always.

Right now, you have nothing to regret.

Just stay this way.

Just stay this simple.

Just stay this kind.

Just stay this youthful.

Just stay this you.

Just stay, just stay.

II