A Letter to My First Grandchild
Taking My Place in the Generations, Missing Those Who Came Before
This essay is part of the Between Chapters project, inspired by the book. What chapters are you between? How did you get from one chapter to another? Share your story here.
What Chapter Are You…
Leaving:
Practicing law, running a business, and raising four children on my own.
In:
Becoming a full-time writer and loving my new role as "Nana.”
Entering:
Choosing what really matters to me.
Dear You,
I want to tell you something.
But first I want to smell you, to feel your tiny body nestled in the crook of my arm, to be awed by the length of your fingers and toes, wondering where they came from.
I want to rub the soft bit of black fuzz on the top of your still cone-shaped head, the softest thing I have ever felt.
And I want to fly to a magical place where you must have been imagined, and be connected to you through generations.
Wake up, so I can stare into those blue eyes, deep and serious, flickering open and closed as you toy with the idea of becoming fully alert, part of this world.
How does love begin? How does it form? The heart needs no instruction; its beating is enough. Love is building with each look, each breath, each touch.
There is something other worldly about you. I am transported to a faraway place — the moon, perhaps — where there is no gravity and we are allowed to float.
I want to know your two-day-old thoughts, stored in that majestic forehead, the yet unformed eyebrows, already furrowed when you are agitated.
I want to tell you something about this world you have been brought into: its harshness, its unfairness, its disappointments. But I won’t. There is time for the lessons I wish you didn’t need to learn.
Today I want to tell you about sunshine, the feeling of giddiness and warmth when you step outside and the sun greets you with a hug, inviting you to stand under its umbrella of light.
Today I want to tell you about strawberries, the sensation you have when you pick up the red dimpled fruit, take a bite, and are taken to a land of deliciousness, juice dripping onto your fingers, daring you to lick it off.
Today I want to tell you about how satisfying it is to be immersed in a book, the characters as real to you as friends or family, the worlds strung together in ways that cause you to stop and gasp, their impact so unexpected. I want to tell you about stories that you couldn’t have imagined taking you places, deepening your understanding of the world, making you laugh or cry, but always making you want to stay, to hear more in this sacred place that is always available to you.
Today I want to tell you about the ocean, the thrill of standing at its edge in disbelief at how grand it is, sand getting stuck between your toes, reminding you how integrated with nature you are. Today I want to tell you about looking out at the horizon, knowing that something is beckoning you from the distance, waves rolling up and melting your fear, the refreshing tinkling of cold water splashing while original thoughts fill your mind as you take it all in, better for having been there.
Today I want to tell you about laughter, how giggles are contagious and spread like wildfire and what an explosive release it is to laugh with your whole body, a reminder in the moment that life is worth living. How sometimes, when you laugh so hard that tears come to your eyes, you recognize another emotion, another possibility on the heels of laughing, a nuanced intersection between joy and sorrow that tugs at your heart.
Today I want to tell you about my dad, your great-grandfather, for whom you are named. He was my North Star, my moral compass, and made me feel as loved as I want to make you feel now. He was a reminder of my own goodness and worth, a place of belonging, the only man I knew whose thoughts, actions, and words aligned and in whose love I felt safe and confident. He would have loved you beyond words.
There’s so much to tell you, little one. But I want to listen even more: to hear what makes you you, what rocks your world, what brings you to your knees, what comforts you, and fills you up. I want to be there to hear about it all.
You are the one to carry on the family name, to make your mark. When I feel your tiny body against mine, I am brought back thirty-four years when your father was my baby and I looked into his eyes and became whole, agreeing in that instant to a purpose-driven life. Caretaking, modeling, providing, guiding, and loving.
This is the passing of the torch. My first son holding his first son. The universe is shrinking around us, pushing away worry and doubt, keeping expectations at bay, a narrowing in, closer and closer, until there is nothing but an unnameable connection. There’s a bond that needs no bridge, a knowing that pounds inside, a beginning, a middle, and an end. A parent and child entering into a pact without rules, without instruction, just intuitive movement towards one another, the sealing of a generational imperative.
I watch the fingers of the child I bore clasping the fingers of the child he fathered and consider the possibility that my work is done.
My heart bursts with love for what possibilities now exist, for our family, for the world, for the future.
You have a place here because others have departed. The truth of that still raw. Those who loved first, who sacrificed much, and who broke my heart when they said adieu.
It’s easy to say it’s the circle of life, and it is, but knowing that doesn’t alleviate the pain, the sorrow, the missing. Grief dissolves into love and the love is elevated, prescient, remembered, revealed. My grandparents, my brothers, my parents.
I imagine us all, siblings, parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles, babies and children, all siting on the screened porch in my parents’ house in Larchmont, NY. I can hear laughter, intense conversation, a baby’s cry, a toddler’s whine, teenage giggling. My mother is serving cheese and crackers on floral plates, surrounded by figs and grapes and newly shelled walnuts. My father is pouring glasses of Beaujolais Nouveau and everyone is toasting you, the latest addition to the clan.
The old are fading while the young are just getting started. Traits are passed on, strong genes are on display, while traditions are cherished and stereotypes shatter. Time passing on. Lives well lived.
You are a part of it all, my love, this tapestry of humans who have endured and dreamed, survived and succumbed.
I hear my father as he stands and raises his glass.
“You have a strong name, son. You will grow into it.”
I see my mother gently kiss the top of your head.
“Root for the Yankees”, a chorus of voices shout.
“Love theatre!”
“Love fishing,” my brothers chime in.
The chair where my mother used to sit when she held your father, my son, her first grandson, is visible both in the now and the then. The light is peering in through the screen, and she is cast in a rosy glow, her fingers, long like yours, but bony and a little stiff, her sharp blue eyes demanding the truth.
I am in that chair now, older than she was then. Time is collapsing. Decades are circling. There is a collective heart beating, bursting with joy, all of us at the party of life. Applause can be heard. You are welcomed to the world and I to the older generation where I step into the unknown, bringing with me tools I was given by those I honor, which I will share with you, my beautiful boy.
Let’s begin with this. Love well, love loud, love hard, and love in the face of it all.
Love,
Nana
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