Notes to a Kindergarten Teacher on the First Day of School

This is a poem a friend sent to me that was written by Anne Ridilla Troy, which I thought was lovely, and was modified by me for my Aiden:

This is the child who was in my thoughts
Long before he was in my womb.
He was named before he was conceived.

This is the child on whose birthday I wept
Because I realized that babies don't keep
And that someday he would begin his journey of growing up
Which to me starts through the entry of kindergarten.

Well, now that day has come.

I've changed his diapers and changed his sheets.
I’ve read him goodnight stories and sung lullabies.

I've been his teacher, his disciplinarian,
His buddy, his confidant and his albatross.

I've seen his first attempts at rolling over.
I've seen him waddle clumsily when learning to walk.
I've waited anxiously for his first word.
And now he uses his logic to outreason and correct me.

I've watched him gaze at the world in amazement.
I've watched him lasso that world in his play.
I've watched him create forts.
Invent his own lightsabers,
and dress up like his favorite superheros.

I've watched him embrace his boyhood in this world.

Now you'll be part-time watcher
Part-time keeper.

Please watch him carefully.
Please keep him well
And please, please help keep that
Sense of wonder in his gaze,
That creativeness and inventiveness in his work.

I know to you he is just one of many
And you don't know him very well.

But I know that he calls hamburgers "hamgebers"
And that he easily frustrates, but often perseveres,
And that he acts tough,
But is really very soft and sensitive on the inside.

And to me, he is one of not so many.

He is my firstborn.
he is the answer to our prayers
And he was in my heart even before he was in my womb.

Aiden's Mom