Nine years ago today I became a mommy for the first time. I told Professor that this morning. His response? “And yeah, if I hadn’t been born, you wouldn’t be a mom to this large crazy family either.” He’s right. That’s why he’s Professor. This kid knows stuff about stuff that I frankly don’t know (and sometimes don’t care to know) and he often says things that are spot on awesome observations about life. He says them in a kid way, but is so often just right.
Professor is a sweet, loving, homebody kid. He likes routine and organization, but somehow, the organizational methods he uses in his room escape my understanding. Like most of us, he doesn’t like change and he really wants life to be predictable, understandable and stable. He LOVES all things nature and has a sensitive spirit for plants and animals. Professor keeps saying that “when I grow up, I’m going to have a house with (insert various animals here) and all my property with be a wildlife preserve with NO hunting or killing. I’ll use live traps if I need them.”
Professor is also blessed to have 4 loving parents. Four because his dad and I are divorced. It happened when he was so young that he will never remember us being together. We both began dating our respective spouses when he was very little, too, so all he knows is 2 sets of “mommy and daddy” that love him immeasurably. Not all children from divorced parents have that. He also has a bazillion grandparents that spoil him, so that’s not too bad either!
Professor is my first-born, my beloved child, my kindred heart. Out of all my children, he looks the most like me. He taught me what it means to be a good mom. He taught me what sacrifice means. He taught me that loving someone while my whole heart is hard and every time he is gone from me, there is a piece of me that is gone.
As Professor is now a “tween,” I wonder what the next few years will hold. I want to keep his little boy sweetness forever, yet I already see that teenage angst coming. I want the lovely innocence of him climbing into my lap to cuddle during a movie, yet I already see that desire to do it totally on his own without anyone’s help at all. I want to keep my baby, but really I want him to grow up to be the man God is calling him to be. Days like today – Professor’s birthday – I wonder what he will be like, what he will do, how he will turn out to be. I wonder which of his childhood dreams will come true.
So Happy Birthday Professor! May God grant the desires of your heart. I love you the purplest!
Rev. Kris Mares 
Your Professor is a lot like my first born and is being raised in a similar manner. Something about a first born that alters a mother’s way of being in such immeasurable ways. Not saying that second, third, fourth etc don’t but its the most drastic change… at least for me!