I Was Only

I was only a baby when I first met my mother.

The memories of that day never really stayed with me, but I can assume I was crying. Thick baby tears slipping down my chubby baby cheeks.

Her holding me tight, whispering that she loved me as my father held her shoulders, murmuring his love and awe at me.

My big doe eyes looking up at her charming face wondering,

"Who is this person? Who am I?"

Then her bringing my small, swaddled body up to her face, kissing my face all over until my cries turn to laughter.

"Katie" she would whisper, "Mama loves you."

My name is Katie. This woman is my mama. I feel like I would have thought.

How lucky was I to have met such an amazing mama!

And look now I'm not just a Baby, I'm Katie!

How much exciting joy must have coursed through my little body.

My tiny grubby fingers clinging to my father's fingers and he smiled down at me.

Time must have passed then, no longer the pasty white walls of the place they called a hospital, but the stucco tan walls of our home.

They would have carried me into the house showing my little bundle to the family dog.

I think I may have been disgusted when the dog licked my face even.

Mama would have carried me into the cradle room, a thin mattress on the ground, covered in thick blankets, and a low to the ground cradle where they would reluctantly place me into.

Suddenly the warm feeling of their hands disappears, replaced by the cool mat I would sleep on by my mama's mattress for the next year or so. How I would wish for her hands in the stead of that mat.

I would stare up in curiosity as the peered at me, my father's arms around her, a soft smile on her face as they spoke to each other in words I couldn't understand.

It didn't matter, they loved me. It was in every look, whisper, and touch they sent my way.

My pretty pink walls, pink and white puffballs hanging from the ceiling, toys scattered around the room, a box of diapers- of course in one corner.

That must have been my first meeting with my mother, no sad cries, no nervous parents, no scary doctors.

Just love. Mama.

Her light caress, her sweet singing, her knowing smiles, her helping hand, her knowledgeable wit. Mama.

Then I was a toddler.

Still my memories elude my grasp.

I can recall feelings.

Ideas of excitement when mama would take me outside. Warm sunlight reflecting on my perfectly round, soft baby fat. Cool blasts of wind in autumn, bright Florida green leaves turning brown in the crisp air. Floating down to the ground with a certain elegance only artists could capture with their swift, symbolic swishes of the old paintbrush's bristles.

The crunching sound underfoot as they held my hands, swinging me up and back down in a cascade of giggles.

The fear and thrill of a bike, teetering back and forth hearing Mama's encouraging cheers for me.

Learning what those jumbles of words they always spoke to me in meant. hearing her tell me she loved me and understanding it.

Her swollen belly when I was five, her leaving for the pasty walled hospital. Me being sent to my grandmother's home for weeks, worried and excited all at once.

Her coming home with a pudgy face baby girl named Riley.

The joy I felt going to school for the first time, bragging about my new sister. Making friends I would still know to this day.

The rides in cars with the wind whipping around my hand, my locks of brown hair tangling in the gusts.

The feeling of mama's hand wrapping around my small one as she hugged me goodnight, tucking the blanket around my whole-body caterpillar style, after my father threw me in bed, sending me into fits of giggles as he shouted "Rocketship!!"

The exhilarating feeling of flying as I felt her hands push me on the swing. Getting higher and higher with every push of her strong hands.

The tears when our cat died at a ripe old age. The wallowing sadness of a kid as my father filled in the hole in our backyard with her little four-legged form in in.

Then I was a teenager.

Life had seemed to turn upside-down, steering a million mph down a crowded highway filled with screeching and scary twists.

I had friends and friends upon friends, but they only wanted to pull me along with them on the road.

Mama waited with me, letting me go at my own pace, pushing for me to be better at times because she knew I could be.

My terrifying panic attacks, buried by her presence.

Calm and commanding, the eye of the hurricane.

Her quirky laughter, her soothing stare.

"My never ceasing questions of, "What am I doing? How do I keep going?"

She would take my hand and rub it softly, whisper to me it's going to be ok as she sits down in the wheelchair, my father following her into the procedure room, a worried look on his face, his hair a mess.

Maybe she would come out that day, maybe she wouldn't. I never knew.

The sad days, the happy days, the funny days, the tired days. She was always there, even in her sickness.

She was tired but stayed awake for me. She was sore but came to my games to cheer me on. She was ready to quit, but she kept going for her me. In my depressing lows, she was there, even if she was in one herself.

Even those lonely days, I could always rely on her presence to brighten my day after school, her cheer to push me onwards past the darkness.

It was supposed to be forever, like that.

I loved my mama,

I still do.

I was only a baby when I met my mother.

I was only a child when I lost her.