I wrote this letter when Gabi was a few days old, but didn’t post it as I was afraid that my new-mom hormones were making me more trite and maudlin than usual (and also, what would a newborn do with a letter? She didn't even learn to read until she was eight months old!). Now on the eve of her first birthday, similar hormones are convincing me that this is acceptable to post. I owe you something funny. And maybe an apology. And a stiff drink.
I want to preserve this moment. Put it into my mental album so that it can be retrieved forever. My sensory album, if such a thing exists. The velvet feel of the wispy hairs on your mostly bald head against my lips. The satisfied sounds you are making as you gulp, gulp milk, the way you are grabbing at me with your tiny hands, alternately pulling my sweater between your perfectly formed miniature fingers and rubbing my chest.
I want to remember the way you are furrowing your brows above your very blue eyes that will soon turn brown, or green or hazel, and your sweet stare, wide and trusting, covered by long still-sparse lashes. I want to remember looking down at your little nose and little ears and wondering how anything that came from me could be so perfect.
I want to remember your baby smell and your baby warmth, and how it feels to hold your little hand. I want to remember the way your mouth looks, wet with milk as you lean into my arms, milk-drunk and happy. I want to be able to pull it all up in my mental Filofax forever.
Soon you will grow out of the clothes you are wearing and when I eventually put them away, I will be surprised by how small they are. I will forget how perfect and tiny your toes are, and the feeling I get when your still-new-smile makes my heart leap into my stomach.
I will not forget how much I love you. Or how happy I am to hold you. How lucky I am that you are mine. But I will forget how tiny you are, and the sound of those tiny little happy moans, even though I will be convinced that I remember.
