Birthday

Although there is actual knitting going on here at my house, my output has decreased significantly over the holiday season, and what is being worked on cannot be pictured here on the blog for Christmas security reasons.

So, I offer instead some thoughts about my son’s 11th birthday.  Yesterday was his birthday, and we had a little family get-together last night with cake and ice cream and gifts.  I made the cake–white cake with strawberry frosting.

birthday cake 

He was a bit excited.

birthday cake 

Eleven years ago, on a Sunday night, the night before my due date, I called my mother and told her, “Well, I can have the baby now.  I finished the baby quilt tonight!”  I was joking.  I thought that, being my first pregnancy and all, it was quite likely I would go over the due date.  I was just hoping I wouldn’t have the baby on Christmas.

He was born the next morning at 8:40 a.m. 

Like most mothers, I remember every detail of labor and delivery with perfect clarity.  It’s the following weeks that blend into a sleep-deprived blur.  Heck, let’s be honest.  Details of the following years blur together.  Moments stand out, though, some funny, some sweet, some unbearably sad.

I think of him as a toddler (“angel baby,” I called him, because he looked so sweet and angelic) and am overcome by sadness and sometimes, almost a kind of despair.  That child is gone now and will never be again.  He exists only in photographs and in memory.  Life with that toddler was so much simpler, in so many ways.  It was hard, too, I have to remind myself, and there were many days when I wished that things could be other than what they were.

When Harvey was a baby, I asked a mother of a five-year-old if things got easier.  She looked at me appraisingly and said, “Things get different.  Not necessarily easier.”  I had no idea.

Yet somewhere inside my great big eleven-year-old boy with all his problems, gifts, and talents, that angel baby still lives. 

After all, it’s what’s inside that counts.

birthday cake

7 Responses to “Birthday”

  1. lorinda Says:

    What a beautiful tribute to a beautiful boy. Angel baby is a great name; I used to call my eleven-year old ‘super baby.’ I needed your gentle reminder that somewhere inside that shining, struggling tween is my super baby. I’m in tears thinking about it; thanks, Sarah. And happy birthday Harvey!

  2. Ellen Says:

    Great looking cake! Happy birthday, Harvey!

  3. Janine Says:

    Lovely cake! Happy birthday Harvey. I know just what you mean about things get “different” as they get older. My two are now 17 and 20 and things still crop up that make your heart stop. Once a mother always a mother 🙂

  4. Mother Says:

    Janine, my daughters are in their thirties, and I still have those heart-stopping moments! Reading their thoughts on the blog has proided some of those. These women can write,can’t they?.

  5. Shelda Says:

    Yes, these women can write! And they seem to frequently make me cry. But it’s a good cry, a feeling of connection, and joy in the sharing. Even when it’s sharing sad things. And especially when they’re happy things.

  6. MonicaPDX Says:

    Hear, hear on the writing. And Happy Birthday Harvey! (A bit late, sorry. Either that or I’m really early for next year.)

  7. debsnm Says:

    Happy, happy Birthday, Harvey – may the rest of your life be as joyous as you look in your cake picture! Mom, enjoy the good moments, and discard the rest. You’re doing a GREAT job!