Tribute to Chris

Happy Birthday CC! I love you for a million reasons, far and above the fact you are my son. I love your sense of humor, your kind heart, your thoughtfulness and your compassion. I love the way you look and the way you cook. You can decorate a house as well as anyone I know and somehow make it feel warm and comfy just by the way you place things in a room. You have a warm and inviting demeanor and people are drawn to you. They tell you things about themselves and open up to you.

You can fix anything from a car engine to figuring out a solution to the flooding problem. Your mind is quick and I admire your sense of decisiveness. You were proficient with computers years ago before most of us knew what a floppy disc was.

You have a bit of a hot temper and a quick tongue. This has gotten you in deep water more than a few times, but I have noticed a mellowing these past few years.

I can’t think of one of your field trips in school that you didn’t bring me a gift. You always did that and I always loved anything from you. One year you got a good buy on t-shirts at Camp Cosby because the year was printed on the front and these were last year’s shirts…I got two of those and wore them for years. Some day far from now, I hope, you will find that I kept one of those shirts in a box of memorabilia, together with handwritten notes, cards and report cards, among other things.

On my birthday one year you didn’t have money for a gift, so you wrote me a two page letter telling me all the ways you found me special. You said I was your best friend and I hope you still feel that way because it still means so much to me.

Since you’ve become an adult, many of your gifts to me are antiques and I have loved them all. You have a sense of style and an understanding of what appeals to me and reflects my personality. One year, the entire family met in Portland for an art exhibit, coming from different locations in the PNW. There was a knock on our hotel door and there you stood with a wonderful bottle of champagne for your Dad and me, together with reservations at a lovely hotel for a special week-end in the mountains for our anniversary. That’s the kind of son you are.

I don’t want to paint a false picture here…we have butted heads on more than one occasion. We have come through it each time with our love intact and our level of respect higher. Your teenage friends used to tell me how you and RC both spoke so well of your parents, while so many of them had nothing good to say of theirs. That made me proud.

I wonder at times about the special woman who will capture your heart completely. You’ve had your shares of entries into the arena of love, but somehow there was always some ingredient missing. I can’t wait to meet the one who finally has the grand fortune to have your love completely. What a lucky person that will be and I hope she loves you unconditionally.

I often feel that no other mother could possibly love her sons as much as I do mine and wonder if other mothers share that feeling. All I know is that I am so blessed to have you in my life to love and even more blessed to be loved by you.

You are such a gift CC – thank you for being my wonderful, beautiful son.

Mother

February 2, 2002