What did you feel when you saw him standing there, finally found? The rise of anger? The wash of relief? Was it then, in that moment, when you knew he was not yours to keep?
Or was it when he let go of your fingers and walked on his own?
Was it when he suddenly could scale boulders and tell stories?
When he went to bed on his own?
Were you surprised? Did you feel the relief of one last thing, right before the sting of knowing you were a little less necessary?
You knew and believed that your little gift would come, but did you really believe he would eventually go? That little feet and refused peas would turn into thundering stomps and more food than you could pile on the plate?
How do you do it - to let go and still breathe?
Your son was always His, never really yours.
But he will always be yours.
All the moments you savored, this was why you pondered them in your heart. Not because he needed them, but because you had the glorious privilege to witness them. Being his mother, it turns out, was for you as much as it was for him. It taught you to love and give your heart away.
He is not yours anymore. He is his own. But the way he walks, speaks, loves - all of that echoes of you.
Can you keep him, hold onto him? No. He was given to you to hold, but only for a time. He is a gift not just for you, but for the world. You will have to let him go, holding in tension that same fear and joy as when he first let go of your grasp and walked, wobbly-legged but free, into the world.