A thank you note...

A thank you note:

Dear mom, 

Thank you for the gift of life. Thirty six years ago this Saturday, you brought a small baby, with a multitude of challenges, into the world. You brought me through the surgeries, and the cysts and the cotton balls taped over my little eyes, as they baked me under the heating lamp. And what you got in return, I'm afraid, was a know-it-all son, who didn't begin to comprehend the road you walked until I had children of my own. Thank you for that too -- were it not for the gift of my own life, I would never have known the greatest joys of my life -- being a husband and father. 

Life did not always treat you kindly. A young marriage and a young divorce, followed by another. But, you never let us boys go without. I marvel, looking back, at what you did to hold our family together. The odds against you were so staggering, that I can only begin to grasp the enormity of the situation, from a distance of many years. 

One of your boys did not complete the journey, with us. At least not yet. But Scott will be yours to raise someday -- I believe that with all my heart. I cannot imagine the pain of losing a child, but I got a glimpse, once I had a seven year old son of my own. 

I don't remember a Christmas that was ever lacking, though there must have been so little. 

You are a successful mother. I know, because the home we grew up in was a home of happiness and love. If not always order.

Thanks, Mom.

I love you.