To My Darling Daughter,
You are my sunshine and my moon. Where would I be without you?
Your funny little laugh and your beautiful smile make everything so worthwhile.
You are patient and you are kind. You are compassionate and very wise. Although I am the grown-up one, you have taught me to be a Mum. At times I am not there to play. It must seem that I work all day and never stop for very long. I know it's true and it's just plain wrong. If I could have my time again, I'd be your playtime MummyBestestFriend. We'd spend every day out chasing snow on chocolate unicorns, away we'd go! Down broccoli streets and past fields of laughs, we'd sleep on strawberries and have lemonade baths. I'd take you where there was no sky, no ground below, just you and I. We'd see each others lives gone past and be two cosmic rainbow blasts!
But our life is here and now and long, so we'll have each other to stay strong. Two girls together, forever true. I'll never have a better friend than you.
I'm guilty. Guilty because I spend too much time working, guilty because if I don't work I let my clients down, guilty because if I do work the hours, I am tired and hopeless as a mother, a wife, a colleague. Guilty because I know the crap I am doing to my body in order to meet my work obligations is probably ruining me on levels I don't even want to think about. Guilty because I choose to spend half an hour blogging instead of meeting another deadline.
How am I supposed to explain this to her? All she knows is that I work all the time. She's gotten so good at playing by herself. I'm guilty for having her as a single parent, knowing she would likely never have a close sibling to bond and play with through her childhood.
I wrote this letter for her at 3am one day last week. I don't even know which day because it was just a shocking crush of deadlines that saw days and nights run together. I read it to her last night. She loved it. It kind of rhymes because she loves words that are 'married', which is how she describes them. She thinks I'm a rocking rhymer.She'll think I rock for another 6 years or so, and then she'll be mortified at having to spend a weekend at home with me. I'm so fucking mortified all these years have passed and that her babyhood has gone completely.
I'm so grateful that she is old enough to read this little thing I wrote, as my way to trying to help her understand how I feel. I'm scared that she is old enough to understand it because it's like I blinked just after she arrived on the table at the hospital and the best part of a decade had already gone by.
In truth, I have developed some horrible habits as a working parent. I remember what it was like to have a workaholic father. Late to get us to school, late to pick us up on the days he had to. Often racing up to the school gates because he had forgotten to pack us lunch and literally throwing paper bags at us that had pies or pasties or sandwiches in them. His liberal use of the word "promise" and how little it added up to. Feeling like we were always in his way, we came second. His job came first. He always told us he loved us, he was always affectionate but I'm not sure it ever really made up for the temper, the controlling moods and the tension in the house when things were bad at work. Am I now parenting the way I was parented, hoping that words and hugs are enough to make up for not being able to simply give of myself?
God.
What are the things you feel you missed as a child from your parents and have you been able to focus on giving them to your own kids?
