Quarantine Quinceanera

Dear Lucy,

I had no idea when I wrote your sister’s birthday letter just over a month ago, that we’d still be hunkered down here at home in late May. I had no idea that you wouldn’t get to finish your freshman year with your friends, and that we would be celebrating yet another “quaranteen” birthday at home. In a lot of ways, this time together has been good for us. You have slept more than you ever would have if school was in session and you were leaving the house at 6:45am! We’ve watched movies, you helped me with clearing out the basement and painting it. Well…you helped a little with that stuff! You’ve had time to work on school stuff and have not been on a strict schedule. You’ve played video games, worked on wigs for HOURS at a time, and even had Zoom calls with your friends. Isn’t it weird to think that we’d barely even heard of Zoom a few months ago? Does it suck to not be able to see your friends and hang out, and do regular end-of-school stuff? Of course. But you, my dear, not surprisingly, have taken this all in stride. 

At fifteen, you are at once a complete grown up, and still my sweet little girl. I’m sure that’s likely embarrassing to hear, but there are times that I look at you and I can still see the curly haired, lisping child you once were. Some nights you still climb into my bed and we laugh and talk. I am so thankful for those moments. Maybe you don’t know how much that time helps my heart, but it does. On the other hand, sometimes I see you and I hardly recognize the woman you’ve become. You are nearly as tall as I am, and you have a poise and togetherness about you that I do not recall possessing at fifteen. I’m not even sure I possess it now, at almost 45. I have loved watching you navigate your freshman year at Lincoln. I know it’s not ending in the way you’d have liked, but it’s made me incredibly proud that you’re doing so well there and you seem to be learning the important things that only an education at Lincoln could teach you: equity, making friends with an incredible variety of people, and accepting people who don’t look like you or come from the same place you do. To me, all the academic stuff comes in a close second to the life lessons I’m watching you learn there.

This year has come with an abundance of change for you: new school, new house, new blended family, and that was all before this global pandemic came and put our lives to a screeching halt. I’m so proud of the ways that you’ve handled all of this. It’s not that it hasn’t come with it’s fair share of crap – it has. And I know that stuff isn’t always as easy as you make it look. But you’re willing to talk about it, and open up about it, and you’re willing to ask for help when you need it. I hope you can hold onto that as you get older. There is nothing at all wrong with asking for help or admitting when you’re overwhelmed. It took me a very long time to learn that, and I STILL have trouble asking for help. It’s not a weakness to ask. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.

This year has also maybe been the hardest for me in terms of parenting the two of you girls. You’re both teenagers now, and there’s a funny dance that I’ve found myself doing with the two of you – and more often with you, because you’re just that much older. It’s the little two step of sharing my opinions with you, but also shutting my mouth enough to let you form your own opinions. It is the constant pull of loving someone so much that you could literally eat them up, but also letting go enough so that you may grow into your own person. It’s biting my tongue and letting you figure things out on your own, and that is so hard for me sometimes. I want to give you the things that I didn’t have as a teen with my mom. I want us to have the kind of relationship where you can tell me anything at all, but also where you don’t NEED to tell me things, if that makes sense. I want to be the mom who you want to come talk to late at night, but I don’t want that to ever feel forced or not genuine. I want to have the kind of mother daughter relationship with you that continues into your adulthood – and doesn’t just stop when you’re 18 because you’re suddenly grown up, which is how mothering was done to me. I want to continue celebrating year after beautiful, hard, lovely year with you because I am just so very proud to be your mom. Happy birthday, little Lucy B. I sure do love you.