Dear Kiddo,
Today is a very special day. Maybe you can feel that, maybe you can’t, but I want to share with you why today is so very special for your Momma. Two years ago today, I became my whole self. Two years ago today, I said with words what my soul and my heart already felt. Two years ago today, I married your Daddy.
It’s hard sometimes for me to believe the changes that your Daddy has made in my life. Maybe this is a chance to tell you the story of how we met and how we became ready to meet you (though I still don’t know if we’re ready to meet you Angel). Here goes, for you:
Your Daddy came into my life at the perfect time, though I wish he had come sooner so that we could have already spent more time together. Momma was a senior in college and had just broken up with a guy; I was feeling pretty down on myself, like I may never find someone to share my heart with. I remember thinking that sometimes my heart felt so full of love I would burst. Momma had never really had a good relationship with a guy and sometimes, I felt like I was doomed to be alone. I always got hurt by boys and I spent a lot of time building up walls around my heart so that it wouldn't hurt so much. I had a journal that I wrote, just like this one. I wrote some pretty awful things in it after the break-up, about how terrible I thought all men were (I’m going to raise you right Kiddo; you’re not allowed to do mean things to girls…). Little did I know as I wrote my angry and bitter words about boys that those words would help me meet Daddy.
Daddy had a journal on the internet too, on the same site that I used. It was actually his birthday in 2004 that he got curious enough to see if there were other people on the website from Iowa. He did a search for other blogs and somehow found Mommy’s. I’m still not sure what possessed him to do it, but he read all of Momma’s angry words and decided to send me a message. He said something about how he was a man and had to agree with me that men sucked big time. I read your Daddy’s words to me, there weren’t many, but they made me laugh. I sent him a message back, saying that I thought girls could be pretty awful too (something I’m sure you’ll learn Kiddo, but I’ll be there when you do to show you that not every girl is cruel).
Mommy and Daddy started sending more messages to each other. Sometimes, we’d post things on our blog about one another or to one another like funny quotes and links or great song lyrics we both loved or that expressed how we were feeling. Then we started talking through AIM, that’s AOL Instant Messenger (something I’m sure you’ll NEVER use and that proves how old Mom and Dad are). Daddy worked the late shift at Oscar Mayer and I would stay up late to talk with him when he got home. I can’t even remember much of what we talked about, but I remember waiting at my computer for his icon to light up, telling me he was home.
I think it was probably around the beginning of January in 2005, just a month or so after his first message to me, that I started thinking that I liked him a lot more than I realized. I remember that he gave me his phone number one night and I called him, intentionally leaving him a message because I was kind of shy about talking with him, voice to voice, since I’d never actually met him in person or even seen his face. He posted something on his blog about know what the voice of an angel sounded like after that call and Kiddo, my heart melted. Daddy would never claim it, but he’s quite the poet when he wants to be and between him and me, he’s definitely the more romantic, which I love about him.
The next time I called though, trying to just leave him a message, his mom Elaine picked up the phone! Oh my goodness I didn’t know what to say! I got scared because I knew I’d have to talk! So I just stuttered and asked to talk to Daddy. I can’t tell you if I was more nervous waiting for him to pick up or while I was actually talking with him! I should have know at that moment, with that knee-shaking, terrified, but terrifically excited feeling that I was in love, but I’d never been in love before, so how could I have known? I can’t remember if we talked long that time or if it was short. I think we were both pretty surprised to be hearing one another’s voices (it was the first time I heard Daddy’s voice).
Over the next few weeks, we kept talking more and more, still a lot on the internet, but also on the phone more. Then, one night while Momma was at home on a short break from college, Daddy and I were IMing and he said the words…the BIG words…the words I hope you only say when you really and truly mean them Kiddo because they change so much: Daddy said, “I love you” and it broke me (Daddy used to “break” me a lot, when he’d say something sweet and I didn’t know what to say in return). Momma had no way to respond at the time. I’d never heard those words before, not from a man. I knew he meant them too, which was so exciting and so scary at the same time! I cried very hard as I read them; I read them over and over again Kiddo. I knew I loved your Daddy too! That was January 29th, and for a long time, Daddy and I used that date as our anniversary.
I told him I didn’t want to say those words to him yet, because I wanted to see his face when I said them. Daddy said he understood. We both did something silly then. Neither one of us knew it at the time, but we had bought each other Valentine’s Day cards. After that night though, the cards we’d gotten for each other just didn’t seem to make sense anymore, because they were cards you send to friends and Daddy and I weren’t just friends anymore. We each went out and got each other a new Valentine’s Day card, but we sent both cards to each other. So instead of just getting one Valentine, we each got two and we each wrote “read this one first” on the old card. Mommy wrote Daddy a poem in the second card and Daddy sent Mommy a paper journal, because he called me Pandora for all the secrets I kept hidden from him because I was so shy around him.
Then Daddy took another big step and asked what I was doing the weekend after Valentine’s Day. He planned a trip to come up and see me at college. I was so nervous waiting for him to arrive! I had to sit through my vocal seminar thinking that at any moment he was going to call me and tell me he was in Decorah! When he finally did call, I drove to his hotel room to meet him face to face for the first time. Your Daddy hid behind the door as he opened it, and I told him it wasn’t fair since I knew he’d already seen me through the security window. We hugged and Daddy had brought me a couple of gifts, one of which was a stuffed puppy named Aimee (I wanted a puppy pretty badly).
Mommy had the whole weekend planned, for the most part, because I didn’t want things to seem weird or for us to not have anything to do. We went to dinner in Marty’s on campus and then Daddy had to sit through a college talent show with Mommy and ALL OF HER FRIENDS. He was so brave! The next night, Daddy took me to a very nice dinner at La Rana Bistro and that night, Mommy and Daddy had their very first kiss. He tried to kiss me a couple of times in the hotel room, but Momma was shy and your Daddy was sweet. He walked me to my car though and there, with the snow falling around us so perfectly, we kissed and I said the words to him. Kiddo, it was like a scene from a movie…until a car honked at us!
Daddy had to leave the next day and it was very hard for both of us. I didn’t want to see him go, because I was so happy when he was around! The good thing was that his leaving didn’t mean we stopped talking. I think we talked even more after his visit. I even went down to spend my Spring Break with him in Davenport and I met his parents (very scary). Your Daddy was so very sweet to me; I didn’t want to stay every night in his parents’ house and make them think I was some sort of tramp or floozy, so Daddy got us a hotel room the first night I stayed so that I would be more comfortable. It is still a joke between your Daddy and I because I didn’t know where he was taking me and all I saw was a big Bennigan’s restaurant sign outside when we stopped and I couldn’t figure out why it had a fountain and a desk and smelled like chlorine (silly me, it was a Holiday Inn with a Bennigan’s inside).
Daddy kept visiting Mommy. He came to see my final choir concert at Luther and watched me graduate. He and I kept talking while I student taught in Des Moines that fall and he listened to me complain about my first job as a teacher (because it was hard and scary and meant I was an adult). We took our first (and to date, only) vacation together up to the Twin Cities. Then Daddy and I decided it was time to move in together. Daddy quit his job in Davenport and got a job here in Des Moines and we got our first home together, an apartment in West Des Moines.
I still remember the day that your Daddy asked me to marry him. Mommy knew he had her ring because she had accidentally picked it out at the mall. Mommy had a bad day at work and came home and was complaining a lot. I didn’t notice right away, but Daddy had cleaned the whole apartment up! He’d even made our bed! He finally had to ask me to stop moving around so much. He’d gotten me a gift and wanted me to open it. I saw a box from Build-a-Bear sitting on the bed. At first, I thought it was the box that was usually in my closet, but I opened it and inside, there was a new bear! It was the polar bear that I wanted! I was kind of surprised at first because I’d wanted to put the bear in an Eskimo outfit, but Daddy had dressed this bear in a tuxedo. Daddy told me to keep looking in the box, so I kept pulling things out. When I got to the bear’s birth certificate, I saw that the bear was named “Will you beary me?” I looked at Daddy and Daddy had the ring ready in his hands. Mommy started to cry a lot then. I don’t know if I actually said “yes” or not, but about a year and a half later, Mommy and Daddy got married in Independence, Iowa outside at the Heartland Acres Event Center. Two years from that day, I am sitting here, in Daddy’s and my first house, crying over the sweet memories and waiting for you to arrive.
I hope you’ll be just like your Daddy, Kiddo. I don’t know if I have the right words to tell you, him, myself, or anyone just how amazing your father is. He is sweet and loving and caring, kind and generous, tender, so incredibly understanding, and Kiddo, he’s funny. He makes Mommy laugh so much! He’s going to make you laugh too. Daddy is perfect for Mommy because he can calm her down, he knows the right things to say when she’s upset, he is supportive when she needs it, he knows when to leave her with her thoughts, he listens so well, and he’s constant. Daddy is pretty much as perfect as someone can get. He’s Mommy’s opposite in all the important ways! Daddy has given me the most amazing things Kiddo, and he’s helped me become me! Without Daddy, I couldn’t be this person, I wouldn’t be a wife, and I wouldn’t get to be your mother. I am so very lucky! I think back to that first weekend we met and it is almost like the weekend never ended. In some ways Kiddo, Momma still feels like she’s having a really long weekend with Daddy, interrupted by annoying moments of work and paying the bills. Soon, you’ll join our weekend fun! You’re going to love your Daddy so much Kiddo! I can’t wait to see you two together!
Love, your Momma
No comments:
Post a Comment