He won't recognize me...Please cut out my heart now...
by
, 09-23-2014 at 03:06 PM (3445 Views)
Yesterday I got a heir (oops hair) cut. It was a drastic cut taking my hair from near my waistband of my jeans to above my shoulders. I could rattle off 50 reasons but the biggest is I wanted a change I could control so I lost control and chose a cut so radically different. But the haircut really isn't the big thing in this story.
I picked up my grandson afterwards. He is almost 9. He lives with me most of the time. His father (my son) is a underwater welder. As wonderful as our state, is we are not known for our ocean views nor does much welding occur in our rivers, lakes or ponds. Needless to say not a lot of work for those folks in the Great State of Oklahoma. Having to work away from home it leaves my grandson living with me for the stability. Off shore oil rigs aren't really kid friendly environments and the school helicopters don't run. Since his BioMom has never been in the picture it has been my honor to stand in for them.
He gets in the car and says very eloquently "Wow". That was it. No more, no less. I plug in the MP3 (his not mine) and crank Hotel California like every other day. It was a minute and half into the song before I realized I was singing alone.
I look over and he is crying. I mean full force tears. I asked if a bee had stung him or maybe the seat belt had pulled his hair. I was reaching for an explanation. Considering he had been laughing when I picked him up something had to have happened. He finally quit sobbing long enough to say that I had made him cry.
I pulled the car over. Please note I used extreme caution in operating the vehicle I turned to him to hand him a tissue and ask for an explanation. He simply said, "I'm not going to recognize you. You already look different and if you change anymore no one will recognize you then they won't know you are my Kunyi and they won't let me go with you and I will have to go with the police until they find my dad because they won't believe you that you are you cause I won't recognize you.
NOTE: The lack of punctuation is reflective of an almost 9 year old reaching mass hysteria in his world.
This poor boy has always had me daily in his life. His dad is gone 2 or 3 weeks at a time. His mother walked away at birth. He sees her sometimes near his birthdays but often not for a few years. I am truly the only constant and familiar thing in his young life. Now I am ripping that away.
When I first brought up having the surgery so I could get healthy and fit we talked about the good things. Roller Coasters, water parks, kayaking, hiking and anything else we have ever wanted to do. His lifelong dream right now is to grow up and us do Amazing Race together. What we didn't talk about was that I would look different. I didn't think it would be so noticeable.
He finally did settle down. I told him since he sees me everyday he will always recognize me. He made me promise to always wear the perfume he picked out in case I change too much one day. That way he can recognize the smell of it. He says he can hear my voice and he will know its me if he closes his eyes. So I think he is going to be ok. But in that moment of dread and panic my heart was sad for him.