The Second Forty

Today, my second born, my daughter Dee, turns forty. She doesn't look it. She's beautiful and smart. She's talented and manages to accomplish much through what often seems like chaos to me. She's a loving mother who does her level best to make sure her girls have all the opportunities that other children have and that they get to experience the things they want to try in life.

Forty years ago today was a Sunday, in fact it was Mother's Day 1969. It snowed a bit that year on that day in east central Indiana... slushy wet flakes that didn't stick, couldn't stick to ground already warmed by spring sunshine. Dee's entrance into our world was marked with hesitation, as if she were unsure if she was ready to join us on the outside. We made three trips to the hospital before we stuck around and finally greeted our baby girl.

She's determined, sometimes stubborn and often makes things harder on herself than they have to be but then, she comes by that honestly. Most of the time, it is because she is trying to do more than is humanly possible. Most of the time, it is because she sets goals and has aspirations far beyond what the rest of the world tries to accomplish. Most of the time it is because she is trying to be everything to everybody else. The amazing part to me, is how often she is able to do exactly what she sets out to do.

I recently read an excerpt from Maya Angelou's Letter To My Daughter (dedicated to the daughter she never had) that touched me.

I am convinced that most people do not grow up. We find parking spaces and honor our credit cards. We marry and dare to have children and call that growing up. I think what we do is mostly grow old. We carry accumulation of years in our bodies and on our faces, but generally our real selves, the children inside, are still innocent and shy as magnolias.

We may act sophisticated and worldly but I believe we feel safest when we go inside ourselves and find home, a place where we belong and maybe the only place we really do.

If this is so, I hope that the home that was built for you is a safe place to come to and that when you go inside yourself to find that home that you know you were loved and cared for and prayed for and wished for. I have no doubt that you are building that haven for your own three girls to go to when their adult days may overwhelm them and they simply want to go home.

I've searched my hard drive in vain to find pictures that I might want to use with this post. I never found the particular one I was looking for or that I haven't already used on previous posts. I know the girls are taking you to Macaroni Grill tonight for dinner so I am hoping that a good picture will come from that event and that one of them will forward it to me to tack onto this post later today. Until then, here's one that I like that.



All that remains to say is that I love you Dee.

Happy Birthday!

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

Today would have been Fred Rogers, of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, 80th birthday. I remember when he first came to television on our local PBS station in Muncie, Indiana. Many people made fun of Mr. Rogers and his gentle ways but children loved him. My children loved him. He was a big part of their early childhood.

People are being asked to celebrate this day by wearing a sweater, which was part of Fred Rogers trademark look. You can read more about Fred Rogers and find information on a project to honor his memory by clicking on the image below or clicking here.



Happy Birthday Fred!

heading off to find a sweater!

Happy Birthday Jamie

Jamie,

As hard as it is for you to say, “I’m 40!”, it is even more difficult to say that about your child. To know that forty years have passed since the day I gave birth to you and found a whole new reason for being astonishes me. How did we get here so quickly?

Forty years ago tonight, your dad drove me to Ball Memorial Hospital in Muncie, Indiana and to this day I remember everything about that trip. I remember distinctly screaming at him, telling him, “Stop!” and like an idiot the loving husband he was, he was actually going to stop the car! “No, don’t stop the car. Stop this from happening! Stop the pain!” He could do neither. We had set the course in motion months before and it wasn’t going to change now. That night I became a mother.

You were 3 pounds and 12 ½ ounces of pure beauty. You were so tiny, yet still perfect in every way. You had all ten toes and ten little fingers and the gorgeous eyes were there from the beginning. Why you were so small I will never know for sure. You were full term and perfectly formed - just small. There were no ultrasounds then, only external measurements which gave us no pause for concern. Your heartbeat was strong throughout the pregnancy and again, nothing in your development gave us an indication that you would not leave the hospital with me the day I went home. My heart broke the day I had to walk away from you and leave you in that place in the care of strangers. I left believing it would be at least a month or two before I would get to hold you in my arms. It took little more than two weeks for you to make the five pound mark required before your dad and I could bring you home.

Watching you grow was one of the greatest delights of my life. Your first tooth, your first steps, your first day of school are etched in my memory forever. Even as a child you had an amazing ability to get along with people. I admired that quality in you even then. You had such a close and loving relationship with Granny, that for the first time in my life, I truly missed not having grandparents that I could be close to. You were so close to Dee and John, even when you were all just being kids and arguing or whatever, you were obviously a big sister that they could depend on and look up to. You were a peacemaker as a child and still carry that trait in you today.

Seeing you as a woman, watching you handle some of the most difficult and heartbreaking circumstances a woman can face, makes me so proud of who you grew up to be. It’s not just the obvious challenges that you’ve faced that make me admire you. It is how you’ve adapted to every change in your life... always with grace, always with humor and with an acceptance of life as it comes. I am so proud of the person you are and I wouldn’t give up the forty years I’ve had as your mother for anything. I wish for you to enjoy every single moment of the rest of your life and to know how much I love you and respect you. I am thankful that Anna and Kayla have such a wonderful model in their lives.

I wish I could be physically present with you tonight but once again I have to be content with leaving you in the care of others. You will always be my baby Jamie.

I love you!

Mom
(now playing: In My Daughter's Eyes by Martina McBride)

through the years

there are so many more pictures I could put on here that would define the past 40 years much more completely; pictures from your younger years that remain in the drawer unscanned; pictures in your dance costumes and cheerleader's outfit; pictures with your friends and with your dad; your college graduation pictures; your wedding picture, which I painstakingly scanned in sections and put together and resized and it would just not post for some unknown reason (not to mention that I wasn't sure how you would feel about it being up here under the circumstances, but you were such a beautiful bride I was going to show off the portrait anyway); there are so many more of you and your girls, pictures with your nieces and some with granny and paps (but again, blogger is just being a real pain about the loading pictures today for some reason); anyway, here are a few that will show the world where you started (almost) and where you are today (almost).

Jamie - 3 months

Jamie - 18 months

Jamie - high school senior

Jamie - with Anna a week after her hip surgery

Jamie - with sister Dee at Christmas 2001
Dee made the dress for Kayla

Jamie - with Anna and Kayla
this was taken the day after Kayla's birth

Jamie - with brother John
summer 2006

Jamie - with Dee and Mom (me)
summer 2006

Birthday Cards and Memories

Every year in August, I look for birthday cards for my granddaughter Sarah Grace and my mother, who happen to share a common birth date. Dad’s birthday follows a few days behind.

This past year, as I looked through the cards for fathers, one caught my eye because of the pair of hands on the front of the card. One was the hand of a child the other the hand of an adult. The words on the card described the distant memories of an adult child remembering holding the hand of a father. I knew that I had to buy this card since so many of my memories about dad involves holding hands. How glad I am that I found that card in particular... it is the last birthday card I will give him. He died September 1, 2006, just a few days after his 86th birthday.

My first memory of Forrest Kauffman as my dad is from the Delaware County Fair the year he and mom were married. I took him by the hand and introduced him to my first grade teacher as my new father, my own father having died from cancer a few years before. I remember countless Friday nights, going to town with him and holding his hand as we crossed the streets of Muncie, generally ending up at the Martha Washington Ice Cream Shop and having a hot fudge sundae.

How many times over the years did I watch as one grandchild or another took dad by the hand to lead him wherever they wanted to go. Dad struggled, like so many men of his generation, with telling people he loved them but he always seemed to respond to the reach of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

I watched in May of this past year as he took the hand of my mother and held it close to his side as he sat next to her in the nursing home, not wanting to let go, because he knew we would be leaving him behind. That picture is not only in my photo collection but permanently etched into my memory as well. By taking her hand, by responding to each of us who reached out our hands to him, Dad told us he loved us in his own way.

My very last memory of Dad is holding his hand as he passed on to a far better place. I have no doubt that he will be meeting each of us someday and that he will take us by the hand as we cross over to join him.

We will all be reaching back!