Too Fast

Chris, every few days:

"I think my voice is getting lower!"

I love the excitement and the hopefulness. :-)

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I watched his baseball game today.

He's playing Pony now- larger field, longer distance between bases,

further to throw.

Going to the ball fields at the beginning of each season is always

like taking a walk through Chris's childhood.

Here's the first field he played on..

I look at the teeny boys on the field, spinning around and around,

kicking dirt, pulling grass, hats being thrown in the air

and mitts on their faces.

They have tiny little legs stuffed into white baseball pants

and their mitts look comically large and heavy dangling

at the ends of their tiny little arms.

As I walk along, I see field after field where we have sat on the sidelines,

cheering, groaning, nerves jangling as he learned to pitch

and hiding our own tears when he would break down and cry on the bench

when things didn't go well.

There are only a couple of fields left to go and then he will have played on them all.

He will be at the end of the line.

As he approaches turning 13 at the end of next week,

I feel that melancholy feeling of many things coming to an end

as the future rises up to meet us, too fast.

Even as I look ahead to fields I don't even know exist yet

as I ask that time slow down, just a bit,

to let this mother's heart catch up.