"You hold my hand and sing to yourself...."

Sticky hand print on the bathroom mirror.... I love seeing it so I don't wipe it off for days. Not because I'm lazy....okay, not entirely because I'm lazy. I just love the smallness of his hands. 4 years old. So much they have learned to do and so much they have yet to grasp.

Those dimples and bands of baby flesh he had for those 5 seconds that he was chubby. The dirt that I scrape from under his nails every night, only to do it again the next. The crooked bent of that one finger that looks identical to my brother's. He still has those 4 dimples on each hand....the last marks of babyhood....the last reminders that they are the same hands that grasped my finger so tightly the very first time I held him in the delivery room. But now they are fading...fast.

Yesterday, I gave my son a wheelbarrow ride.....down the middle of our street...running. Classy. (Quick! Who wants me to be their neighbor?! Line forms to the right.) I wanted to do it because I still can, while he's still small enough.

I can't ever go back, but I can go forward. And hopefully he won't remember those long years when I was here but not present. I'm here now. I'm present now. And I'm loving every minute of it.