Today, our boy is three years old.
Last night, I was binging the latest season of Veronica Mars. This has been the first Veronica Mars I’ve ever watched without Tim and it hit me so much harder than I expected. We watched all 3 seasons a full three times and discussed every detail… plus the movie. Which he purchased so fortunately I can watch anytime I want. I was missing him so much watching it and wanting to dissect every detail with him! But last night, on the eve of our boy’s third birthday…. right when – three years earlier – I was in labor and telling him to wake/get up: it was seriously go time…. a commercial came on (because I pay for the cheapest version of hulu) for a photo product… a Dad introducing his baby son to HIS dad, and then zooming out so you see they are looking at a photo and the dad saying to his son, “I wish you could have met him…”
And then I burst into tears. Uncontrollable sobbing on a commercial during Veronica Mars.
People sometimes say to me that it must be easier with/for D. Maybe right now it is easier for D… for the last two years it has certainly been easier with him FOR me. The girls who have real memories of their dad struggle and ask the hard questions. I naturally responded to someone once who said that to me, “well tell him that in ten years.” I didn’t mean it to come off as rude, and the look of horror that was returned I did feel guilty about. I get it. In a situation that is so unimaginably devastating, you want to find the silver linings, the “at least”s… but sometimes, they are not there. I don’t know what the future holds. I don’t know what it feels like to grow up seeing photos of you as a baby with your dad, or photos of your dad, hear people talk about him, but have no memories of him yourself.
I do know this child has every stuffed animal you could dream of, and he chooses to sleep with Daddy doll all the time… Here he is camped out on my floor….
This morning, my Facebook memories popped up, and on Declan’s 1st birthday, which happened over a month after his father had died, I had written “There’s no getting around it, it sucks that he’s not here to celebrate your first birthday. It’s so unfair….”
And that’s really it, There’s no getting around it. It’s always going to suck that he’s not here. It’s always going to suck that he doesn’t get to grow into a man with this other amazing man in his life, setting an example. Joking, hugging, loving him every step of the way.
Interestingly, that suckiness does not diminish the wonderful human that he is. Our D.
Earlier today, at his school, with his sisters:
This is three.
So very loved from Heaven and on Earth.
Gather by Image 