Here's hoping the worry was for nothing (11/14/05)

It won’t be long now. I am counting the days until I can see for myself how big my daughter has gotten with her first pregnancy. From the pictures she sends she looks exactly like a pregnant woman should. Personally I looked like a beached whale by this stage in the process. I felt about like one, too. Fortunately my daughter seems to be doing fine.

I have a whole stockpile of baby items to take with me and a baby blanket to finish. You may remember this blanket. It tried to be a hat for awhile until a lady at work kindly unraveled it and gave me new and more explicit directions on how to crochet. The blanket is flat now and an appropriate size. Except I have decided it needs a scalloped edge, a ruffle or some other girlish embellishment before I can call it done.

We have a year’s worth of catching up to do on Thanksgiving weekend. Just listening to my daughter’s plans wears me out. She wants to finish decorating the baby’s room, have a baby shower, go shopping, maybe get an ultrasound so I can “see the baby,” and do several other things while I’m there. Oh, and there’s Thanksgiving dinner to deal with also. I have reminded her that I’m only going to be there for the weekend but she keeps adding things to her list of how we will spend our time.

It doesn’t matter that we talk on the telephone several times a week or that letters and packages make their way across the country almost as often. We get together once a year and we make the most of it. It is the only time I can touch her and look into her eyes. It is the only time I can feel old when I walk with her, as I have to run to keep up. Now I know how my own mother feels when we go shopping. It’s the only time my daughter can see for herself what color my hair is now. Here’s a clue: it isn’t the color I was born with.

I know it is better for her to be so far away so she can lead her own life without my interference but that doesn’t make it any easier. It was hard to hear her crying on the phone when she realized that she was going to have to have her precious dog put to sleep. It is times like those that the distance between us seems insurmountable. How I longed to hold her and assure her that she was doing the right thing.

Then there are the times when she calls with good news, “Mom, I got a promotion,” or “Mom, the baby was sucking its thumb in the womb.” I love to hear the joy in her voice as she relates happy things in her life. And I am proud of her when she is distressed over an injustice and even prouder when she tries to right a wrong. I am happy that she cares so much when something offends her sense of fair play and am amazed that she has more tact than I ever will.

I have enjoyed watching her grow up and change from a little girl into a competent woman. She has accomplished more than I ever hoped for. Most of us feel that way about our children. We cuddled and cared for them when they were tiny and we did our best to give them what we thought they needed for them to grow up to be strong, healthy, self-sufficient adults. Some children will never achieve that goal no matter how great we are as parents. Others will grow up to be wonderful people in spite of their upbringing.

Then there are those of us who try to cram a year’s worth of parenting into a weekend. I plan to spoil her as much as I can in those few days. To that end I have more shopping to do and plans of my own to make. Plus I am easing into major worry mode that I will miss the plane or that I have told her the wrong airport or that some other inane disaster will strike. There is a part of me that is afraid we won’t recognize each other.

But it won’t be long now and I can’t wait to see her once again. Only when I see her again will I realize that I have worried for nothing.[[In-content Ad]]