Dear Josh,
The summer between my junior and senior years in high school is one I remember very well. You’d just been born in March–but in Bruce Springsteen’s homeland, so I’d only seen photos of you. When your mother said the two of you were coming to stay with us that summer, I had no idea what to expect.
I’d learned a lot already because of your cousin Daniel, who was then more than a year old. For example, I’d had to accept the hard truth that I was no longer the baby of the family. That all those presents under the Christmas tree were his. That baby birthdays are a much bigger deal than teenage birthdays. That learning how to say your first words and take your first steps and eat your first solid foods and all that stuff eclipsed family excitement over getting a driver’s license or opening your first bank account or going to your first prom.
That little rat!
But that’s not all Daniel had taught me. Because of him, I learned what it was to truly love another being without condition. To want only the best for him. To hope every single day that he’d be safe and well. To suffer through each earache and sneeze and bump as if it were my own. To feel like my heart might explode out of me when he laughed or did something adorable. To see the world through his eyes and know again what wonder and amazement even the tiniest, seemingly most insignificant, things could evoke.
Then what worried me was… What if I only had enough space in my heart for one? If I loved you, would that take away some of my love for him? If I thought you were amazing, did that somehow make him a little less amazing?
And then you arrived, and I learned what parents and very fortunate aunts know: Love never divides when you give it. It only multiplies.
Oh, the joy of that summer. Your mother and I shared a bedroom again, as we had as girls, only you were in there, too. Every day the first sound I heard was either you crying or you laughing, and both were okay with me. Instead of being a surly teen who wanted to sleep in, I couldn’t wait to hang out with you. I’d hold you, watch your eyes get huge as you took in the world. I’d change your diapers without complaint–um, even that time you wee’d again as I was changing you, and the stream landed on the “Certificate of Going Steady” I’d painstakingly hand-lettered for my boyfriend. I’d give you bottles, walk with you in the yard–although you must understand, I had to compete with your mother, grandparents, and the aforementioned boyfriend for that privilege.
You had the biggest laugh, and everyone laughed with you. Your angry tears were just as booming, and your whole body would turn red with rage when you cried. I’m sorry to say, the crying made us laugh, too, that anything that small could hold so much emotion. We found our old Polaroid Swinger that summer, and these terrible black and white photos are from it. They looked fine at the time, but now you can barely see the images in person. Scanned and adjusted, they look like they were taken using some of those cool hipster applications that are all the thing these days. From the beginning, you were cutting edge and ahead of your time!
School friends came over that summer, and Debby and I had bought two big posters for coloring with felt tip pens. My poster was of fish in the ocean; hers was of flowers in a garden. We all sat around the dining room table coloring them. You’d lie next to us or sit in our laps, cooing to yourself or “talking” to us while we colored. Your presence made the days cheerful and fun (and I think it should be noted that years later, when that summer’s boyfriend had his second son, he named him “Joshua David,” same as you).
You made my last “childhood” summer magical for me, and created a love in my heart that has never diminished, never felt anything but pride in you. I love you so much and hope today you’re having a happy birthday. I’m glad to be counted among all the people who are thrilled you were born.
I love you,
Aunt Becky
Infant Josh with Grandmother Dear
His best friend was Jess, and since this photo doesn’t have names on it, I’m assuming this is Jess (on the left) with my father. It’s dated, so I know it was taken the year my father married my mother, possibly taken by my mother. Four years after it was taken, my father was in school at Alabama, he and my mother had a three-year-old and a five-month-old, and Jess died when he wrecked his car on a country road outside their hometown.
