That’s what your grandma calls you.  And there are times when the light hits your hair just right and I wonder if perhaps the light is coming from inside you.  For you are certainly our golden boy; you are the one who brought the sunlight in. 

How could we have known, back when you were just a spark of an idea, a barely whispered thought, that you would be the one that made us into a family?  That with your safe arrival into our arms, we would never be the same.  We were parents.  Mommy.  Daddy.  The names felt awkward, presumptuous on our lips.  I remember being so happy to be pregnant, feeling as though I had read so much and prepared everything I needed.  Then too soon it was day three and we were leaving the hospital.  I felt like asking the nurses “Are you insane?  We have no idea what we’re doing!  What if we can’t do this?” 

But you didn’t mind.  You didn’t mind all the fumbling, the clumsiness, the simple matter that everything we were doing was too foreign to be graceful.  You didn’t mind when we had to turn your carseat practically upside down at the hospital, with you in it, trying to figure out how to adjust the straps.  You didn’t mind that I brought an outfit for going home that managed to drown you.  You didn’t even mind when I left a tiny lamp on in your room all that first night because I couldn’t bear to leave you in the dark.  I knew it was ridiculous, after all, you’d never seen light until you’d been so rudely introduced to it a few days earlier.  But it was just a teeny lamp, and you slept anyway.

In two days you will be heading off to kindergarten.  We’ve had almost five years together.  In those five years you have become this whole person right in front of our eyes.  I had no idea how amazing it would be to watch you grow up.  I had no idea how quickly I would be able to see bits and pieces of the man you will grow up to be.

I brag about you, that you are sweet, smart, loving, strong.  Even during our struggles I see how frustrated you are to be angry.  You work so hard to be a bigger boy than you really are, to make us proud.  And you are smart.  I love watching you learn and listening to all the things you have figured out so far in this crazy world.  I’m afraid to ever tell you how crazy it really is.  I still like to pretend that I will be able to protect you from it.

I have such hopes and dreams for you.  I want you to see the world, and choose where you want to live once you have seen it.  I want to take you to all the countries that I can’t believe one small boy knows.  I know you will do something worthwhile, something meaningful…either for one or for many.  I love watching you concentrate, and wonder what will catch your attention when you are grown.  I hope you find the world a friendly place, and the people in it worthy.  And, oh, I try to remember when I’m setting limits for you, that someday I will want you to go beyond them all.  Just not today. 

I love you, my sweet golden boy.  You were the first to call me Mommy, and I will never tire of hearing it.