Love

At the end of the day, this is about love. I love both of you more than you’ll ever truly understand. My hope is that by reading these stories, you laughed, reflected, and maybe came to a different understanding of who I am as a person—maybe even a better one, a closer one.

From the moment you came into my life, I knew that you both had to be at the center of my writing. For years, I wasn’t sure how to do that. I wove parenting into some of my fiction, and it was fine, but I always felt like I was hiding behind characters, putting on a mask to tell the story. Eventually, I knew I had to stop hiding. I had to write directly about us—me and you—without the filter of fiction. (Though don’t be surprised if I do that again someday. Old habits die hard.)

These stories are imperfect, just like life. They’re snapshots through my eyes, a personalized view of events. So often, the world wants to lump people into groups—into generations, stereotypes, and labels. “These people are tough.” “Those people are soft.” “Everyone born between this year and that year acts this way.” It drives me crazy. Life is never that simple.

I don’t want you to live by anyone else’s definitions. I want you both to be your own people. More than that, I want you to be good people.

Right now, you’re sitting in your pajamas, watching your iPads on a rainy Sunday, and I know that someday, I’ll miss this so much it’ll hurt. I hope that on those days, even when you’re grown and out of the house, we’ll still have a strong foundation. I hope that you’ll always feel you can come to me, and I hope there isn’t a single moment in your life when you doubt how much I love you.

I love you. Every second of my life.