Dear Maly,
You turned 19-months-old today. The past four weeks have flown by so quickly and has left me pondering all that has happened since my last letter to you. Regardless, you grow to be more fascinating and even more beautiful every single day. I love watching your grow, but the older you get, the faster time seems to fly by.
I think your coolest milestone this month has been the new faces you have learned to make. You now have a sad face, where you purse your bottom lip and drop your eyebrows. You have your surprised face, where you lift your eyebrows as high as they’ll go while flaring your nostrils. And you have your angry face, where you crinkle your nose, lower your eyebrows and crinkle your forehead. Often times when you’re eating, you’ll deliberately employ all of your emotional expressions which clearly indicates that you’re definitely your mother’s daughter and, quite possibly, schizophrenic.
We spent a weekend at your Grandma’s house this weekend. While your mom was getting ready to take Fall photos of you in the front yard, something bit you on the palm of your hand. At first we didn’t think much of it. I somewhat resolved that a fire ant had stung you. An hour later you were still crying in pain. We had no idea what had stung you and had hurt you so badly. Your mom and I both worried that maybe a brown recluse or black widow had stung you. We didn’t see fang marks, so we somewhat set ourselves at ease. It wasn’t until we got back to our house in Austin that the redness on your palm has cleared and we could make out a series of stinger marks on your hand. It was then that we determined that you had been stung by an asp.
The fear of not knowing is what I have learned to be one of the greatest fears for me as your father. I want to be able to fix the wrongs in life for you, and if I don’t know what those wrongs are, I feel useless. Now I know that an asp will hurt you and from here on out, I give you my word that I will forever rid your path of any asps. You can find comfort in knowing that you can go into the fourth grade and when you’re to tell the class what your father does for a living, you can say, “My daddy kicks asp”. And then I’ll have to pay for your speech therapy.
Your uncle Eric came down from Des Moines to spend five days with us this month. Your uncle Eric really loves you and I’m thankful that you’re able to spend time with your extended family. Two extremely valuable things that you learned from Eric during his stay here were “booger” and “danger”. Danger is a good word because now instead of saying, “MALY, NOOOOO!!”, we can say, “Maly, be careful. Daaaaanger!” And then you’ll know that you should stop whatever it is that you’re doing that your mom and I deem as dangerous, and immediately stick your finger into one of your nostrils.
Just this past week you did something that was very cute, yet very frustrating in the same breath. I was taking a shower when you came up to the glass shower door with my eye glasses. You said, “DADDY!! Eyes.” You call my glasses “eyes”.
I said, “Thank you, sugar. Can you please go put Daddy’s eyes on his nightstand?” And you immediately trucked off into the direction of my side of the bed. I went back to bathing myself and proudly thought of my bright young daughter who understands her dad and takes his direction well. It wasn’t until I had finished showering, brushed my teeth and my hair when I walked to the nightstand to put my glasses on. I couldn’t find my glasses where I had instructed you to leave them.
“Maly, where are Daddy’s eyes?” I asked.
You gave me a blank stare. I then looked down at the floor and saw the ear piece of my glasses poking out from underneath one of the throw pillows. I bent down to pick up my glasses and came up with only the ear piece. You had managed to successfully break my glasses.
So Daddy’s eyes are now off limits for you for the time being.
Regardless, I love you today more than ever. I miss you while I’m at work and while you’re asleep at night. I love checking on you before I go to bed and night. I softly rub your head and whisper that I love you. I cherish those moments more than you’ll ever know.
I love you, Sugar.
Love,
Daddy
