Hour by Hour and Day by Day, she is the one.

My oldest baby is soon to be ten. How did this happen so fast? As I right this she is 300 miles away at horse camp for the week. It is something she wants and needs and she is with friends and safe. Still I worry and yes I cry. I miss her. I woke this morning without homeschooling lessons to do and it was hard for me to put on foot in front of the other and move past the sadness. I looked at shelves packed with books for her and I to read together. The young ones listen as well, but it is not the same, they do not understand as she does that every hero has his own inner battles to win. I love the stage Crystal is in, not to say I do not love the youngers, but I am used to my days being filled more with head thinking, the kind of day that does not help the youngers. They need to dance and sing and clap and jump and be cuddled. They need the picture books that are short. What they certainly do not need is their mother having a melancholic day though I am not sure it can be much helped.

Hour by Hour and Day by Day I think Crystal has been the one person I have sent the most time with in all my life. Not my own parents, not a sibling, not my husband. I thought about this late into the night last night.

I broke it down, doing simple math with my house all to quiet. No hope of Crystal coming in to tell me she could not sleep and would be up playing for a while or asking me how to spell a certain word.

Simply put, both my parents worked when I was small, then I was given each day to my Grand Parents to raise, but then school came… after school I had 2 hours with them, before dinner and back to my fathers house. Mom left when I was 6. I spent one hour each day with day with Dad, for supper only. Children where to be seen and not heard. Then dishes and chores and homework. All while he was busy on projects, fixing things, hobbies. Then bed, while he watched TV. Even when my step mother came along, things did not change much though she was home. My grand parents kept raising me during the day and some on weekends. My brother was send to day care with an aunt as my grand parents could not handle him. I had friends take up that afternoon time and weekend time as I grew up as well. And by 16, my grand father passing years before, I was hardly home at all before I moved to my absent mothers house to flee from the friends and life I had fallen into. They came more friends. Better ones at least, but no more time with family really. My best friend, now my husband took up most of my free time, but still school took most of my time specially with homework. Married at 18 and 6 months latter pregnant, my husband had joined the military and for the past near 11 years now he has been away almost as much as he has been home. But in that time, in near 10 years Crystal has always been with me, with the exception of this week, and 2 weeks when she was 5 years old.

Nothing has come between us. Not school, not day care, and I only worked for a few months once and I could not deal with missing her, and rarely did we ever have sitters. Together almost always for 10 years. No wonder I am feeling a bit lost without her. I have gotten to see all those firsts. I feel blessed. I guess some would say even spoiled. I treasure her and our time together and as I look to the future it is with such mixed feelings. A time will come, must come I would even say, when she will no longer look to me to help fill her days, but rather her friends and the rest of the world. I am not ready.

A rock sits heavy in my middle. Emotions tighten my throat and tears threatening to spill over sting my eyes. I miss her. She is a light in my life and I am a better person for being blessed to be her mother. I am also a bit lost without her.

I hope she is off having fun and that she is not distracted missing us. Horse camp we hope will give her some more confidence in herself and help her be more assertive. She knows if she is not the horses will do as they want and not listen to her. LOL Oh how I wish I was watching her.