Hope

After weeks of wiggling, tonight, while biting into a tomato, this happened.

And when she turned and smiled at me, my heart skipped a few beats. My mom-friends had told me that the first front tooth to go, takes a piece of their youth with it. And as usual, they were right. She looked as if she had aged in her loss. And it felt so clear to me that these beautiful moments are fleeting.

I have every reason to hope that there will be many more.

But for me, it is a hard time to hang on to hope.

It is a hard time not to live with an undercurrent of fear. 

It is hard not to look into her eyes and not fear for what lies ahead.

I hope that the present we are living in now is one she only truly knows about in history class.

I hope she never feels the fears of this time.

I hope she always has access to health care and the freedom to make choices about her health and her body.

I hope she has clean air and water to surround her; mountains to climb; oceans to sail.

I hope that the education of her blooming mind is valued and respected.  

I hope that one day, she will become friends with a young woman who remembers spending night after night in an airport, waiting to seek refuge in America. I hope this friend will tell her about her home country and those nights, a distant memory, now, safe in America. And maybe they will realize that those nights were so different for one another - my child remembering the wait for the tooth fairy and her friend remembering the wait for hope. And then they will be hopeful together for the world they share.

Above all else, I hope she, and all of us, know a world that loves and practices kindness over all else. Because in the end (and the beginning and the middle) that is all that really matters.

I hold these hopes for my daughter, and her siblings and her friends, and all of us. Because wanting good for everyone only means good for oneself. Good begets good. Just try it. 

I will hold on to the precious moments of tonight. And my eternal optimism, which keeps me hoping. I will love. I will practice kindness. I will work to teach her these values with every breath. And I will hope that it prevails.

Tonight, the tooth fairy will hide her tooth in the jar with the other two, and place a dollar in its place under her pillow. And I will imagine that her dreams tonight are of this magic and hope.