To Jessie on her 24th Birthday ...

Jessie,

You turn 24 years old today!

I started this “letter” 5 hours ago and only got that one line typed …

It is odd, really – sometimes the words flow, and sometimes they don’t – but today is your birthday … so they are supposed to flow! I stopped when my mind stumbled across a memory of your Daddy saying something rather disparaging about the letters I write to you and post on my blog. He mentioned that you cannot read them, know that they exist … so, why then do I really write them? To impress my friends / readers? Why?

I got up and walked away from the desk to think on that for a bit. And apparently five hours later I am no closer to being able to write you something special and wonderful and thoughtful on your birthday – but I still have a few things to say … to YOU. My Jessie, nobody else, but since my life is an open book – this will find its way to my blog, of course.

I write you letters because I need to express the tremendous amount of love I have for you. You have no concept of the love I have for you. You have learned to say “I love you, Mom” but still I think that the depths to which someone can love another is a deep, vast well that you have yet to tap.

I write you letters because I know that their are angels in Heaven that whisper in your ear as you sleep and keep you comfortable and not afraid of the dark and happy – and I KNOW that they tell you how much I love you and my letters are delivered. I truly believe that you know what I write – I don’t really know how, but angels feel right to me today – so I will use that until something else becomes a better metaphor.

I love you in a hundred thousand different ways and you have taught me so much!

Two nights ago Daddy was sitting in a chair and I was in bed reading when he blurted out “Twenty Four” and I didn’t understand what he was talking about. He then said “You were working at Morton Thiokol when you were twenty four” comparing where I was at the age you are turning today.

I don’t think I slept that night. My pain was not under control, so I wandered down memory lane that Daddy had brought up. By the time I was twenty four – I had been married for (ahem … don’t tell anyone) five years, I had been out of college for two years and I had worked on a Top Secret project for the Air Force at the Jet Propulsion Lab. I remember that this was during the Cold War and it involved (I might be arrested for divulging this information …) spying. That I am not too concerned about saying that is that if you had a Top Secret security clearance during the Cold War – what the hell else would you be involved in? I mean really?

** Lori graduation from USU - 1984 **

I learned a lot about myself on that project. I learned that I don’t like to be in tall buildings during an earthquake – it gives you a queasy stomach and a surreal feeling and then the panic that you might die kicks in … not fun, not fun at all. I learned that there was danger lurking around every corner – based on what I euphemistically called our monthly “Paranoia Meeting”. This was where they gave you instructions on what to do if your spouse was kidnapped, or you were blackmailed or extorted for information. It was where I memorized phone numbers and how to ‘escape and elude’ capture. It was where I learned that I really, really was not cut out for that kind of work! I was the only female on the project and maybe it is a testosterone thing … the guys seemed to get jazzed after the meetings. I always walked out feeling sick and scared to death for my family and looking over my shoulder for days (But, hey! Now I knew how to look for signs of how to spot a ‘tail’ so it was all good right?)

** Lori In LA - 1985 **

I grew up a lot during that time but was happy when Daddy graduated from Cal Tech with his masters and we both took jobs with Morton Thiokol in Utah. No earthquakes, no evil people lurking around the corner ready to kidnap and torture me to obtain the information in my head. I was happy.

Sadly – the year I turned twenty four was the year of the Challenger Disaster and it was determined that the SRB (Solid Booster Rocket) that Morton Thiokol made was the cause of the explosion – thus I began working on the Shuttle Redesign team. My job was to install all four main frame computers that were coming to support the engineers who were doing the heavy lifting on this project (including your Daddy) and keep them running.

This took weeks and weeks of training in Dallas, Texas and I was gone from home a lot. Just a ‘working woman’ doing her job. On one of these flights to Dallas, the airplane that I was in hit what the captain afterwards called a "pothole" and we were free falling for several seconds. This is a very scary thing to happen! Anyone without their seatbelts on immediately hit the ceiling, and everything not tied down floated about the cabin. When the plane finally leveled out everyone and everything floating about the cabin (I had my seatbelt fastened) crashed back to the floor. I believe it was during these seconds that felt like minutes that I realized that I was mortal and one day was going to die, wondering if that was the day?

It was not – but I grew up a little bit more – not to mention taking years to get over my ‘flying jitters’.

Our life together – while wonderful and very cosmopolitan as we passed each other on our way to the airport, or getting a call from another computer pal saying my husband just totally ambushed the ”A” IBM mainframe computer with his mathematical calculations and all other 500 users were locked out while his computations crunched and locked up the CPU and to call him and tell him to cut it out, was lacking something.

It was not complete – we were a couple, but not a family. I had been told in High School that having children was an iffy proposition for me due to a condition I had so we started all the fun, fun, ever so much fun infertility treatments. Two years after I was twenty four – you arrived in this world!

You must have been very excited to get here as you came weeks early! And suddenly – I was a mother! Something new for me – but sadly it was tainted with fear, sadness and guilt. I never got to hold you after you were born since your APGAR was, I believe a 2 – they whisked you off and Daddy went with. As I lie there on the bed, basically forgotten for a bit I prayed you would be OK – because basically I could do nothing else.

I learned that day that I was not the ‘Superwoman’ that I thought up to that moment that I was. I could not do, nor could I fix anything and everything I wanted to. I had limitations. I had to learn to accept what came at me and that the only choice I had in the matter was how I reacted to the situation that I had found myself in.

Twenty four years later and I have YET to be pleased with the way I have reacted to something that has come my way, having no control over it but my reactions. I guess that I need more practice. A very nice lady the other day on Facebook told me that I “have a genuine sense of humor – grace under pressure, which is a rare and precious quality”. Rare and precious indeed! It is what I have worked for for twenty four years – and I thanked her profusely – telling her it was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me. Since it has been so important to me – my reactions to a situation I find myself in – it gave me hope that one day, maybe one day – I will actually believe what she wrote …

So – that is MY life up until my twenty fourth year. Very, different! The differences in our first twenty four years are probably glaringly obvious, but I want to articulate them – if only for myself and remind me how wonderful you are.

I told you that I loved you in a hundred thousand different ways and I would like to point out a few of them.

I love you for the joy you exude. I have never seen another person who can pack more happiness into a minute of the day like you can!

I love watching you get excited about something, it is a gift to see.

I love that you love everyone on this entire planet unconditionally – and have decided that each and every one of them need a hug from you! This experience has taught me more about ‘humanity’ than probably anything else in my life. Watching you, chasing after you, dragging you away from strangers that you are engaging in conversation and attempting to hug over the years taught me that there were basically three types of people in this world.

Since you have no syndrome and we fixed the birth defect on your forehead – you looked like a perfectly normal little girl, so as you approached a stranger – it was not as if a downs child were approaching them – that they could understand and prepare for. You always seemed to surprise and confuse people when you started to act … well – not ‘age appropriate’. As I said – three types of people – basically lumped in a bell curve in terms of numbers. The middle group I call the 'normal' group – would be a little surprised and taken aback by you invading their personal space (before I could rescue them) but were polite, yet relieved when I got them out of the situation. On the left side of the bell curve were those that we won’t spend much time on since it really does no one any good. They were the rude, mean and ugly ones that seemed to enjoy hurting and demeaning others and just being plain vile. If I had not seen and been exposed to the experiences with you that I had – I pretty much would have not believed that there were people in the world that could be so cruel … but sadly they are there. But! On the right side of the bell curve are the people that I believe are angels walking around on earth in disguise. The minute you opened your mouth and started talking – they would get a huge smile on their face, they seemed to love you instantly and when you hugged them THEY HUGGED YOU BACK. This small army of angels keeps my faith in humanity intact – and without you – I never would have been one to see all this.

I love that you worship your Daddy. He is the greatest man on this planet – and you know it! He is kind and gentle and loving with you. Watching him with you and how much better he is with you makes me love him all the more. Your daddy is a great man.

I love that when you bug Ryan – as much as he grumbles and complains – he has never been anything but kind to you. The only times I have seen him react badly to you is when you have tried to physically hurt me – he is very protective of me and that makes me love him all the more. I love that you always ask about him and where he is. He has grown up into a wonderful man with a kindness and gentleness that is rare in a young man his age – I could not be more proud of him if I tried.

I love that you love Charlie! Everyone that knows you gets to hear about Charlie. I love that she brings you such joy! She is fun, isn’t she?

I love that you talk on your ‘finger phone’. I love when you tell me to turn down the radio because you cannot hear the imaginary person you are talking to well enough. I love when your finger phone drops a call and you get frustrated! Your ‘finger phone’ is one of the most fun and hilarious things to watch as you talk to … who? Angels? Friends? Any and all and tell them about your day!

I love that you have some bizarre crush on Arnold Schwarzenegger! You will watch any movie he is in! Disney Princess movies and ‘The Terminator’ – that is my Jessie!

I love that you are getting more aware of when you have crossed the line with me and that you worry if I still love you. You ask and you ask and I always assure you that I do. I hope that one day – my baby girl – you will realize that I will love you, no matter what – forever and ever!

I love that you taught me how to love. To love FIERCELY. Your present came and it happens to be a boom box (wont your group home just love me now …) and some Disney Princess CDs. I opened it up and opened up the CDs to make sure your favorite song was on one or the other and it was! It is from "The Little Mermaid" and is called "Part of Your World". I put it in and as it started to play, tears streamed down my face as it reminded me of a time a few years back when I was on a Disney Cruise with my extended family and Disney said that adult mentally retarded persons were not … well 'allowed' is too firm a word, but they assured me that you would not be able to go and do all the activities that you would want to do with all the other 3 – 6 year olds – thus, basically, you were not invited. I went alone and Daddy stayed home with you and Ryan. It was hard because it was so much of what you love and I wished I could have shared it and experienced it with you.

I went to a show one evening with my family and the girl on the stage started to sing "Part of Your World" and I started to sob! I was very embarrassed and ran out of the auditorium verbally accosting the doormen and then threatening Minnie Mouse. I was a woman out of control – I felt as if I was not in my body, but watching myself from a distance as I totally lost it. I loved my daughter so much and that the people on this ship had said she couldn’t come had enraged me to a point where I was totally out of control. My frustration had morphed into a rage I have never experienced before as I threatened Minnie (we actually knew each other from an encounter earlier and I know that the person under the ‘head’ was just concerned about me – but I could not seem to stop myself) I remember screaming at her to ‘back off or I would toss her over the bannister’ WHAT KIND OF PERSON THREATENS A DISNEY CHARACTER? Running back to my cabin to collect my computer and escape into the night to a dark corner where I would not see any of my family – I wondered where security was during all this? I assumed at some point I would be tackled and wrestled to the ground, then restrained until I apologized to Minnie or something, but no one stopped me – the crazy, sobbing woman running to her room.

I spent that night in a dark corner watching a beautiful light show of lightning and had hours to wonder what the hell got into me? I have never acted like that before or since. And I realized that it was a volatile mixture of love and frustration. I wanted SO BADLY to share that experience with you because I knew that you would have loved it – and I couldn’t. I realized that night that my love for you was rather fierce. I don’t believe I would have actually thrown Minnie over the banister – but I think I was prepared to take the first step! A mama bear – angry that a group of people would decide that her beautiful daughter was not ‘good enough’ for their cruise.

I quickly stopped the song – the one you sing along to so that I wouldn’t be a sobbing mess – and recovered enough to try to start this letter again – and it has become, I believe a wee bit out of hand!

I love that everyone that meets you with an open heart falls in love with you – who wouldn’t? I always smiled that whenever we went anywhere – at some point we would hear a shout: “Jessie!” and someone would come running to give you a hug! I remember being flabbergasted in Disney World in Florida as this happened! We simply cannot take you anywhere without someone who loves you wanting to give you a hug!

I love that the magic of Princesses and Santa Clause and Fairies will always abound in our home. Most families grow out of this ‘magic’ but with you here – magic will always be with us!

I love that you made me a mother. I thought that I was a ‘big shot’ – a female in a male only world. I had the world by the horns and nothing was going to stop me! I am woman … hear me roar! And then you arrived and I realized that all that had previously gone on in my life meant ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. I was now entrusted with one of Heavenly Fathers most valiant spirits and it is a task I don’t take lightly.

I know in Heaven you were my superior – you always have been, always will be. I am very honored to know you and that your care has been entrusted to me. I know I fall short … ALL THE TIME. But please know that I have never, never stopped knowing what an important task being your mother is. You are my angel – and to quote a movie because it always makes me smile – You are an angel … but not that kind of angel! You are mine and I love you.

I love that your joy and spirit filled our home when you lived here and I have yet to get used to that ‘Jessie ether’ being gone. We have our Sundays and you have your new life and I know that it is right and good – but sometimes I miss you very, very much.

I basically love you just because you are you – exactly as you are – you are perfect to me.

So you at twenty four and me at twenty four - who had accomplished the most? Made the most out of their life? To me, these days, it all boils down to hope, love, joy and happiness – for yourself and giving it to others. So – my dear baby girl – you win – hands down. No question.

Happy birthday love, see you in a few hours …

Mom