Dear Married Daughter,
First of all, I am amazed that I am old enough to be writing this letter. When you were young, and sitting in the grocery cart while we shopped, people would stop me and comment on how cute you were and I would smile and thank them. They would often look at me and say, “Don’t blink. It goes fast.”
I felt sorry for them because they were not standing with [there] with a child, and they had a look of longing in their eyes that I could not relate to but recognized it, as a fellow parent. I never really believed them, because I knew I had your whole childhood still stretched out before me. I had time. But, the days are long, and the years are short, and you grew very fast. They were right.
On your wedding day, I felt so torn. You found a wonderful man, and you were beaming. You walked down the aisle, you danced with your dad, you left smiling radiantly with sparklers shining around you. Just before you passed by me, I had to resist the urge to reach out and hold your arm for one last hug before you climbed into the car with your new husband. I didn’t.