Ten years ago, I launched a project for my eldest daughter.
She was in the middle of her junior year in high school at the time. I shared a photo of the project and an explanation on my blog.
“She will be home for another 18 months,” I wrote. “She’s begun full-time college studies. She’s working two jobs. She’s active in her youth group. Her life is full and filling with all the things that will take her out into the world.
“And still, there’s so much left to share. I know that her leaving won’t be the end of our friendship. Actually, I know that as she grows, our relationship will, too. But there is so much of my heart I still haven’t spoken into hers.
“So, I began a project. I’ve bought a journaling Bible and I’m spending the next 18 months or so annotating it for her. I’m searching my favorite verses and I’m writing to her the words God has spoken to me in those places. I’m pouring my soul into the margins and hoping the Holy Spirit will take my offerings alongside His and make them into something beautiful for my girl.”
My plan was to give the Bible to her when she graduated high school. But it just didn’t feel finished then. So, I pushed the gift date to college graduation. And it still didn’t feel finished. I held on to the Bible. I also started three more journaling Bibles — one for each of my girls. Over the years, morning by morning, I’ve added to the margins of all four.
My daughter will get married the day after Valentine’s Day. I’m in Connecticut, obsessively refreshing the weather app. We’ll travel to Virginia soon. The Bible sits on my desk, and I’m still adding to its margins every spare second I get. I’ve ordered a beautiful leather cover for it, embossed with her new name. The pages are worn now, after 10 years of truly using this book. I admit there are some very slight wrinkles left when someone’s errant cup of coffee splashed the open Bible. Just a little bit. It’s fine.
Tears fill my eyes every time I think about letting this Bible go.
I ponder this reaction. It is true that I’m attached to the Bible; I’ve poured my heart into it. But I don’t think that’s the reason emotion chokes me. When I first wrote about the Bible, I titled the post “All the things I want to share with her.”
It still doesn’t feel finished.
Of course it doesn’t.
How could a mom ever capture all the things she wants to share between the covers of a book, even the best book in the world? In the last week, as I think of words I want to add, realization dawns. I will give her this Bible — with all my love — a week from today. But it will not contain all the things I want to share with her. Being someone’s mother doesn’t end when she graduates from high school. Or college. Or even when she gets married.
Because mothers keep learning. Life keeps teaching. There will always be more things between us. We’re entering a new season of friendship — the two of us. She’ll receive the book, feel its weight, inhale that new leather cover, and be on her way with my sincerest thoughts and prayers held in her hands.
And I will begin anew, still praying, still sharing from the tenderest of places in my heart.
Foss, whose website is takeupandread.org, writes from Connecticut.
