The Never Normal

I have Father’s Day things to say but they’re too fresh in my mind and the writer in me can’t string them all together just yet.  So I’ll go back to yesterday, when D and I took Jonah to the falls and he got to walk around in the water for the first time this year.  He’d said “bye bye D” a few times on the ride there, but we’d thought nothing of it because he’s always saying bye-bye to the passenger…bye-bye daddy…bye-bye-M…

But on the ride home he said, and I quote:  “bye-bye mama…and D, too!”

It was the first time I’d ever heard him use the word “too” like that – or complete a sentence with any kind of qualifier.  D and I looked at each other in shock, laughing and exclaiming over this new speech-leap.  It was pretty cool.  Joy prevailed!

All this over your 9 year old boy speaking something that’s not just a piece of a phrase.  He used the word “too” in a sentence.  He’s learning, my precious little boo — slowly, and in spite of whatever it is that’s making him violent, but he’s learning, damnit.

You never dream this could ever be your life, and then it is, and then you can’t dream it not being your life.

You don’t know what to dream.  Every day is a circle of hope and exhaustion, anxiety and happy surprises…laughter and sudden lapses back to despair.  There is only now, to celebrate or suffer.

Yesterday D and I celebrated together, and Jonah chimed in grinning ear-to-ear from the back seat: Is so funny!  is so funny!

Yes, my boo, it sure is.

Right now, anyway.