Jackson turns 7 on Saturday. Another COVID birthday for the books. He doesn’t appear to mind…children are so resilient. He calls it ‘the germ’ and seems to have created a logical filing system for where all the pandemic pieces go. A natural introvert, this moment in time is, in some ways, a bubble of perfection that I imagine he will go back to when looking for a safe space in his mind…. Other times, he can’t hug his Nana or play with his friends and he will curl into my lap so we can rock, hugging silently for a while…
I have been thinking a lot about the things we carry. My grandmother was raised during the Great Depression and then survived WW ll. She carried the memory of hunger and the lack of readily available supplies. She maintained three fridges and deep freezers full of food, plus a garden and a pantry, and - it was never enough. She saved ribbons and wrapping paper, buttons and newspapers. She sewed her own clothes, darned all the socks and had every possible cooking or baking substitute known to man catalogued in her mind, at the ready.
I used to tease her and she would laugh , “You never know when you will need it, and if you do – best to have it tucked away, just in case.”
Jackson turns 7 on Saturday. What will he carry? What lessons will imprint? Will our borderline OCD hand washing carry over? Or will he struggle with affection outside of immediate circles? I hope he carries the extra snuggles and the hikes into the back country. I hope he carries a healthy respect for science and his hilarious sense of humour. I hope he carries the incredible confidence I have seen emerge in the past few weeks, but most of all, I hope he remembers being almost seven and the master of the universe on his very own beach.
Submitted by Heidi Cuff.