Monday, May 18, 2009

Must I Still be Learning?

(click on the video twice to play)

My parents took India camping for the long weekend since I had to work, and she just came home a few hours ago. She was grimy and exhausted and she squeezed me tight around my neck because she had missed me, and, because she was so exhausted, she kept breaking down into fits of weeping and wailing.
"Momma?" (Cry, cry, cry) "Do you love me? I just don't feel like you love me." (Cry, cry, cry) And so I would snuggle her and kiss her and fill her up with love and finish making her dinner /reading her a story/brushing her teeth/getting her to bed.
And repeat.
And repeat.

She is her momma's daughter. Last week was a rough week, and by Thursday I was a weepy roller coaster mess in the parts of my brain that I usually keep to myself. I always get embarrassed when I get like that, but I suppose it's inevitable: bad things will happen. I will get hurt, and then I will get sad. But for this long weekend, I got to talk to my sweet friend in England for a couple of hours and see her lovely pregnant belly. I rocked it out on the karaoke with some friends from church, and I sat on a rock in the sun by the river with my shoes off and burnt my nose.

I told India tonight that it's alright if she feels sad, and that if she needs to hear me say again and again that I love her, that I will - that I will be glad to tell her how special and lovely and beautiful she is to me. So she stopped crying. We snuggled until she fell asleep, and I came up here to say I think I'll hang around here awhile longer.

6 comments:

Mama K said...

I hope you do hang around here awhile longer... sometimes your words, the way you express your thoughts, is so beautiful that my very soul is nurtured and lifted and encouraged. Fed. Like today. Thank you, and I am so glad you are the kind of mother who will say it over and over till she can sleep in peace. God's like that too, isn't He... He keeps telling us over and over how much He loves us, 'til we can (if we are listening) rest peacefully. I love that in this thing at least, you are parenting like God does.

Terog said...

I am glad that you will hang around here awhile longer. I enjoy your insights and the lovely words you find to express them.

Amber@theRunaMuck said...

Please stay. You make me cry. I love you as much I know to. Thanks for laughing with me sometimes, too.

dwc said...

thank for staying.

first-time commenter,
dwc

Cherie said...

Little girls. The things they teach us. And the hearts they break - beginning with mama's. I feel it, Angela, I remember it, and while my daughter's are teens still there are those emotional moments when they just need assurance. Again and again.

You're a good mom!

And little India, a precious charge.

The photo above is good good proof that you and she are feeling the love groove once again.

And, yeah, glad you are sticking around. I understand the urge to flee - feel it myself now and then. But then, yeah, the urge to stay returns. And I'm always glad I do.

Angela said...

thaks, all. and thanks for your first time comment, first time commenter, dwc.