My Soccer Habit: Facing Reality

I haven't really wanted to talk about Isabelle's graduation. Let's face it, I'm not the biggest fan of the girls getting older and moving forward in their lives. I prefer to bury the facts deep under some heavy blankets in the dark corners of my heart and pretend they are still 4 and 6.

Seriously.

Case in point:

This girl looks way too old for me to know what to do with. Those blue eyes! The straight teeth! That fantastic brain of hers!

Facts: Her teachers love her. I went up to one teacher to thank him for being so fantastic and passionate about history and geography and he tells me that he thinks Isabelle is "wicked smart"
and wants to keep track of her and where she is going.

Then I started tearing up and he was faced with a speechless, weepy mother and was looking over my shoulder for someone to come and save him.

I can't handle it.

When Isabelle told me her all time favorite teacher, the one she couldn't have done it without, I had to thank this woman. I grabbed her at graduation and before I finished my first sentence, I was choked up. I quickly handed her the card I had written since I pretty much knew I wouldn't be able to get the words out. It was too much for me.

They have built her up, encouraged her education, celebrated her accomplishments and held her hand through her losses (I think she got a B one time in 5th grade, she was devestated).

Fact: Images of future moments in life really make my heart gummy. Wasn't she just 4 and dancing with her daddy? Now she is almost 14? Someday she will dance with him at her wedding, and look just as radiant and I will be in the corner sobbing. Life's big moments are sometimes just too big for me to wrap my arms around.