Darling Garden Witch,
It isn’t Toby. I am praying and praying and praying. Robbie is, too. We kneel at bedtime and we pray. For Toby and for Sal and Robert. Robbie asked who Toby and Sal were—he’s so smart. Just turned three and speaking in full sentences. I guess the universe makes up for lost things, right? He’s lost his ability for making mischief with his body so he makes it with his mind. Anyway, he asks me, “Who are Sal and Toby?” and I say, “Auntie Rita’s husband and son.” And he says, “Don’t worry, Mama. Daddy will protect them.” It’s so odd. Sometimes I clean forget that Robert doesn’t know much more than your name. It’s strange how certain parts of lives intertwine while others stay so solitary.
Don’t worry, Rita. (As if just saying the words makes it true.) You can’t lose your boy because I didn’t lose mine. That’s the way it goes, right? Two strangers connect and there has to be a reason for it. I’ve often felt that perhaps we are creating some sort of shield around each other. A magic cloak to protect us. I believe it. I really do. So try—try not to worry too much.
My heart aches for you as I know how you must feel. When Robbie was sick in the hospital I’d watch over him and think, Where did he go? Where is he now? But mostly the thing I thought and still want to scream is, “I want my boy back!” You want your boy back. You’re his mother. It’s what we do.
My mother, when she was sick, told me she thought I’d take to mothering more than she ever could. She didn’t apologize for being distant or for sending me away. I didn’t expect her to. But she did say that I was different and she thought I’d make a good mama. And when Robert was there, next to me at her funeral, I saw my children in his eyes.
Then, when I found out I was pregnant I was thrilled. And I do love being a mother, but I can almost understand my own mother’s reservations. When you put your whole heart in something you risk just that. Your whole heart. It’s a high roller’s type of gamble. I can tell by your letters that you love with your whole heart. As I love with mine. Too much lately, but I’ll save that for another letter.
It’s coming on Christmastime and my Christmas wish for you is a letter from Toby telling you he’s just fine and that he’d like nothing more than to curl his grown body up in your lap in front of your tree. I’ve already put mine up. Levi cut it down from the back of some property we own up the road. I’m full of Christmas this year, I don’t know why—but the whole town is. Festive, festive, festive. I’ve bought an ornament, a ceramic sunflower and I had the jeweler etch Rita across the base. It hangs at the front and dangles in the firelight. I do wish you were here.
Do something for me if no word has come from him by the time you get this letter. Try to think of Toby as a ball of light. A ball of shimmering light bounding across the ocean and running through forests, over mountains and into the fields next to your sweet home. Anna calls this “Creative Visualization.” I use it. It works.
Love,
Glory
P.S. OH! I almost forgot. I made my first speech at the Women to Work forum. I was so scared, Rita. I could HEAR my heartbeat in my ears. I thought I might pass out or even toss my lunch. But Anna told me something that helped. She said, “Just picture thirty Robert Whitehalls out there. Tell him your speech as you would have practiced it in your own living room in your own sweet, white house. Oh. And speak slowly, Glory. You talk much too fast.”
And you know what? Those words just came right out of me. And before I knew it there was applause. APPLAUSE! (Can you believe it?)
But Anna said I talked too fast anyway.