Well, this was a weird realization:
I have to sign the kids’ birthday, graduation, and all of the other special occasion cards in the future now without “Dad”- just “Momma”
I don’t leave the card and a pen in our closet for Tom to sign anymore.
It hit me when I signed Maggie’s Eighth Grade graduation card. Tom would’ve been so proud of her. She had been on high honors the first quarter even though she missed loads of school because her Dad died. She is so much like him. Give her an obstacle, she’ll plow through, because she wants to show everyone she can. And she’ll do it above everyone’s expectations. She’s amazing. (To be fair, she intentionally took the next quarter off from high honors, because she needed a break “after all she had been through”).
Tom would’ve had some really great, wise advice for her and she would’ve soaked it all up, written it down and had a plan to get it done. She has goals like him. She knows exactly what she wants to do and she’s figuring out how to do it. She says the wisest things sometimes and it makes me laugh because it sounds just like Tom. What kind of a 13/14 year old girl talks like that? She’s so deep and smart, and observant. She is so much like her Dad.
She’s been looking at real estate in different states to help her decide where to go to college. She learned that a lot of graduates end up getting a job in their college town, so naturally it would be wise to understand the real estate market. What??
Last year, she was so interested in colleges and had been researching them, that she and Tom took a tour of one a couple hours away. Tom called the college office and explained that his 7th grader wanted to see the campus and wondered if it would be okay if they explored it a little. They told him absolutely- might as well come for the college tour they give high school juniors and seniors! So naturally, the seventh grade girl and her dad toured the college with a bunch of high schoolers. They got special treatment and came home with a ton of loot! I think that was one of their favorite days together. I have a beautiful picture of them on campus that (thank God) some stranger had offered to take.
In case you’re wondering, I wasn’t allowed to go on the tour with them, because, “Well Mom, Dad just knows about life more than you do.” It was said with innocent intentions and I took it as such. Also, I was proud that if I had to come in second place, I was coming in second place to Tom. I was happy that she had someone she admired so much and that I was lucky enough to be married to him. What a true gift.
I wonder what he would’ve written in her graduation card last week.
I wonder if he would’ve planned another college tour this Summer.
I wonder how he would’ve felt seeing her just 8 months out- how tall she’s gotten, how much different she looks.
I only know he would’ve been very proud. They were two peas in a pod. They really got each other. Sometimes I didn’t get either of them, but they’d hang out together and be totally in sync. I wish I was more like him in that way. She needs that. But I am not him.
I dried my tears and signed the card without “Dad” – just “Momma”.
