This week has been unexpectedly emotional for me. You’ve been away on vacation in Florida with Nonna and Papa, as well as Aunt Dana and Uncle Andrew, and your cousins.
I didn’t expect to miss you so much. After all, you’re like 9 year and a half years old now. You’re not a little boy anymore.
And that’s exactly why it hit me so hard…
While I couldn’t possibly be prouder of the boy you’ve become, I’ve been coming to terms with the fact that those days of you being a little boy are gone.
For the past 4 days, I have been journaling my thoughts and feelings through a song I have been writing; so that I myself can better understand what I am going through right now.
Today, I was finally able to record the song; one of the few times I was able to do so without crying.
And when I say crying, I mean bawling.
It helped when your Aunt Dana told me today that you are currently taking a break from swimming in the ocean to watch WWE Wrestling.
You don’t treat your stuffed animals like they are real anymore, but you still believe WWE Wrestling is real. I can settle for that. You’re not fully grown up yet.
I love you, Jack.
That boy’s been growing up, that boy’s been growing up on me
He shouldn’t be enough, he shouldn’t be old enough
It doesn’t seem, it doesn’t seem
Those Hot Wheels have all raced away
Like the friends of Thomas the Train
And now I’m missing that boy who went with them
He’s growing up
Those stuffed animals all used to be real
But they’re starting to all disappear
And now my baby boy, first born bundle of joy, is growing up on me
That boy’s a part of me, that boy’s a part of me
My son is growing up
Holding on to memories, never letting go of these
My son is growing up
It takes so much for me to ever cry these days
So it’s funny how these words are drenched in tears
You and I have a special “father and daughter” bond. It’s undeniable.
By nature, I am not a needy person. I don’t “need” people to “like” me to feel good about myself. Otherwise I would be like Michael Scott or Andy Bernard on The Office.
I can accept that the world doesn’t revolve around me.
But I will admit- you have an effortless way of making me feel wanted and needed.
It’s in subtle ways, like when you come home from school everyday, you immediately run to my “office” at the kitchen table and yell “Daddy!” before engaging in a monologue about whatever accidentally hilarious story you have to tell me about school that day.
The “Post COVID Summer”- I guess? Now that we’re half way through June, it feels like the general reaction is that people are caring less about the pandemic; based on the news channels changing their focus on the next topic they want us to freak out about…
We’ve already traveled as a family to Florida this summer, and you get to go again next week with Nonna and Papa; so you are definitely having a vacation of a summer.
But at the same time, we just learned that as of today, your week of summer camp just got cancelled due to the owner of the camp getting COVID.
So yeah, it’s a weird summer. I don’t know what to believe.
But ultimately, I’m doing my best to help you have a good time and feel like a pre-4th grader! After all, you’re already spending much of your summer locked up in our house, as Mommy works from home upstairs, while I occupy the downstairs working from the kitchen table.
Now that you’re 9 and a half, it’s an age where I am doing my best to be mindful of sorting out the balance between what’s too “babyish” for you, versus what is inappropriate because it’s too heavy on the PG-13 side of things.
You surprised me recently with your actions, not your words. You taught me that you are still at a crucial age when you want to hold my hand, as a symbol of feeling close to me during father-and-son activities.
A couple of weeks ago when our family was at the beach, you and I had a daily routine of wading out into the crashes waves. You reached out for my hand the moment we took the first step into the water- every time.
But that makes sense. Those were pretty rough waves.
However, this past weekend I insisted on taking a walk at a nearby trail; just you and me.
The moment we stepped out of the Jeep, simply stepping off the asphalt of the parking lot onto the grass, well before the trail even began, you insisted:
“Here… Daddy.”
You reached out your hand to me and didn’t let go during that whole hour-long, very sweaty, hike.
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