“Clothes are meant to wrinkle.”
“Children are meant to stain things.”
“Love is not improved by keeping it untouched.”
I lowered the page.
That sentence hit me harder than anything else.
Because I had spent Lily’s first year afraid.
Not constantly.
But enough.
After losing a pregnancy at 14 weeks, I had treated joy like something that could be punished if I trusted it too much.
When Lily was born, I counted breaths.
I checked the monitor every ten minutes.
I woke Mark because I thought she felt too warm.
Then because she felt too cold.
I researched every rash.
Every sound.
Every strange diaper.
I had wanted her for so long that sometimes having her felt less like receiving something and more like being handed something breakable.
Grandma had noticed.
Of course she had.
The letter continued.
“And one more thing.
“Stop looking frightened every time that child climbs something.”
