wondering.

On a Thursday, I found myself writing about a Wednesday. It was a special kind of Wednesday, one where we bid my son’s two front teeth farewell. The following evening, I found myself in bed writing a poem to those two teeth– “like soldiers at the gates” — and feeling the gentle fall of tears.

Parenting is such a wild book. Broken up my varying chapters– some short and others very, very long. We give birth to these gummy beings and watch like eager fans as teeth poke through. Then (the horror chapter), we wait and root for those same teeth to become wiggly, unstable things and fall out.

But I live for this. I love every single stage. I know very well this is the start of The Change to becoming Boy, and I am unraveled by this thought. Which is why I wrote a silly little poem to my son’s two front teeth.

I feel like I should do this with my own Big moments. A poem or a note of reflection as a way of capturing This Thing Now before the moment is gone.

Anyway, here is Wednesday.

Wednesday

On a Wednesday
we said goodbye to
two front teeth
But also
to your boyhood

Those two pearly whites
like soldiers at the gates
Slowly, wiggly, crookedly
Out they came
(Painfully so.)

And now, the gates are
open wide
Welcoming, beckoning
boyhood on through

The smile that was
The smile that is
The smile that will be

All because
of two front teeth
on a Wednesday