He doesn't know that Queen Annes Lace makes my eyes water and my hands itch. He doesn't know that I gripped the stem of that four inch wide flowering crest of white, knowing that he picked it for me and that I loved him for it. He doesn't know that I listened to every word he said, intently missing his small voice and odd observations. He doesn't know that I miss him and miss him most when he is standing next to me, putting his small hand inside mine, reminding me again that my world is bigger than me.
He doesn't know, but I know.
"Guatemala?" He says. "But is that further away than China?" I tell him no, but that I'll be gone much longer than I was in China. "And when you come home, will you come home to our house?"
I don't know. I wish, but I don't know. Somehow it is easier to see a year in advance when you are eight and life is a series of sledding months, swimming months, first day of school days and last day of school days. It is easier to know how much taller you will be in a year judging by the marks on the wall that have grown as steadily as you have. It is easier to know that Christmas will always fall on December 25th and that you will wake to the smell of baked oatmeal and sausage every year. It is easier to love and be loved in your own right, and not because you've made it somehow in the realm of adulthood. It is easier to suppose that everything will always be the same and nothing will ever change. It is easier to be eight than it is to be now.
