The First and the Last

It’s the end of the school year where I live. I’m seeing a lot of social media posts celebrating and paying tribute to children graduating, getting older, moving on, achieving milestones.  A lot of them are about youngest kids.  

"My last one."  
"My last preschool graduation"
"My baby's last prom."
"My last prom," as parents assimilate into their children a little.  

I imagine what it must be like for these people who have celebrated various repeat events in their families over the years, to get to this point where they are feeling extra sentimental because they won't ever do it again since it's their youngest child doing it. The startling and seemingly abrupt end of an era. 

And I think about my oldest/youngest child and how every moment of his life is and has been our first and last, always occurring simultaneously.  Each event, milestone, achievement, phase, is the only event, milestone, achievement, phase we'll get to participate in.   Just as soon as it started, it's over. We’re starting, it happened, and then it's gone. Forever. 

I knew it when he was young. I felt it in each moment.  First steps taken were the last first steps.   The chance to teach him to ride his bike, swim in deep water, pee standing up, would all happen once (I mean, probably. hopefully)  I wouldn't get to practice or put any learned lessons to use again for someone else soon.  Every event was singular, with no precedent, and no repeat.  Which really is how I might describe the child it all pertains to.  No precedent and no repeat for a kid like Julian.  No one to compare to, no one to stack up against. Every path forged was a one-time thing, a single use. And the moment he steps off of it, it becomes instantly memorialized. Plaques stacked, monument built.  Every moment of existence, carved and then immediately embalmed in flame. Bronzed for the mantle.  And I cherish it. I've always cherished them, all my bronzed moments. And I have had to build new mantles to hold them all so that I can look at them and see how lucky I have been.  I know what I have.

And it's been sobering.  Every failure is uniquely cemented. I can never "try again" with another. "Do it better" the next time around. I can learn from my mistakes, sure. But I get no chance at redemption with a new one not yet marred.  I've heard oldest children referred to as "first pancakes," the idea being that parents usually get better at parenting and the ensuing pancakes/children benefit from that better parenting. Which kind of sucks. Because if it is, indeed, a reflection of inexperience, of novice parents, why are we pointing at the resulting pancake and not the dumb cook. I'm just saying. We could also be saying to oldest children, “Sorry, failed experiment."  

I imagine in families with multiple children, parents learn with other kids. Having others gives context, a better understanding of what might work better.

This child is this way, so this works best. Therefore, with this other child, I hypothesize another approach is necessary, as they differ. I will try it and observe.

I can never say this. I never know. I never have a different experiment.  It's always the same one, over and over, starting a new batch of batter, pouring and pivoting everything on the first, the one and only pancake.  

If I may continue this weird analogy,  sometimes our pans get too hot along the way and we scorch them down the line. Sometimes we run out of butter or oil or nonstick material and the pancake loses their crispness, their butteriness, or their fluffiness because the rest of the batter sat too long in the bowl and settled or got weird.  Maybe the first pancake is the best pancake, everyone. Did you think about that? Maybe it's not about us anyway. Maybe pancakes aren’t experiments but unique gifts, as I often feel. Maybe we should treat each pancake like the first and the best. A new one to learn from. Perfect as it was poured. Anyway.

Childhood is fleeting, they say. They grow up so fast, they say. People tell me this all the time and I want to say to them, “Who are you telling? You think there’s a minute of every day I don’t think about this? From the moment he was born?” This reality might be more true for me as a parent of one, but also in a way, maybe not felt so acutely as others, blindsided by that deniable (for a time) but inevitable day of the nest emptying.

I've never had time to get comfortable in a certain phase, deluded by an idea of false ownership. I've had no chance to settle on a sea of mistaken calm that the winds don’t change on a dime. I've not been able to fool myself into thinking anything would last because I'm too busy spending my days frantically running around with my arms outstretched, sand slipping through my fingers. Watching it happen, helpless to stop it. He's like a bullet train, but instead of watching it pass as a bystander (blink and I've missed it) I've decided to jump on, along for the ride. It goes just as fast, but I'm able to be a more active passenger, moving to where it takes me instead of watching it pass me by.  In others words, I suppose I've been forced, by necessity, to develop the ability to know what I have when I have it, because the minute it's here, it's gone.  This has bled into all areas of my life, not just regarding the child. He’s become a symbol for it.

Our third roommate has always felt like a super longterm guest or boarder. He pays rent in new ways every step of the way. His adorableness- even now as a teenager, with his dimpled cheeks stretching out into a man-jaw and stubbly skin. In his love of jokes and teasing, the workings of his enigmatic brain which feels like waking up to a bunch of new puzzles. His ideas, his quips, his zingers, his confidence, his constantly critical, examining eye. Not to mention chores or tasks, like how he’ll fill and bring up my water bottle as I lay in bed, as if infirm (I am not), at 9:30pm. “That’s a good boy.” Or his much appreciated computer skills and iphone tutorials. His general talent for forcing those around him to accept the space he demands to take up, in whatever shape it may take, never settling for less. 

When he's here, he fills every room. When he's not here, I sometimes forget he exists. Because it feels normal, like how I remember it from before. He's more of a dream, anyway. A phantom, a specter drifting through walls, a full-torsoed apparition with dirty bare feet (guess that doesn't make sense) that reads books and eats string cheese. Every day is a séance where we repeat to the ghost the sentimental chant, "You're welcome to stay as long as you like."  But we know it won't be, can't be forever. We know he's not really ours.

So when your first is also your last because he's your one and only, you clutch him as hard as you can, knowing how futile it is. It’s how you view a sunset, or experience anything truly beautiful. You can't keep it. You can't hold on. You know you can’t. You can only watch, hopefully from the train. Which I suppose, agonizingly, is kind of the magic and the point.