Dear Mom, Dear God

Dear Mom,
Remember all those days when I was a kid and I would follow you around while you were trying to do stuff (which was probably every day). And I would talk incessantly. I could tell that after a while you weren't really listening anymore. I thought maybe you didn't want to hear what I had to say anymore. Well, I just wanted t tell you that I'm sorry. Because I live with a little girl who looks suspiciously like I did 34 years ago, and she follows me around and talks non-stop. Even when she can't follow me around she talks non-stop. When I'm buckling her into her booster seat in he car, and we're in a big hurry, which we are 99% of the time, she starts telling me stories that have far too many details. And I have to tell her to stop so I can shut the van door and get into the driver's seat, and then she can resume her talking. Except sometimes, when I'm really distracted, I forget to tell her to stop a minute and I just shut the door in her face. And I can still hear the din of her voice through the car door. Or like right now, when I'm trying to type this post really quickly, and she is just going on and on and on and on about the 73 clown pictures she's been drawing over the last twenty minutes and how she's going to bring them with her wherever she goes so that, on the off-chance she runs into a clown somewhere, she can give him one of her pictures (coloring used to be a quiet activity). And I don't even realize she's asked me a question and is waiting for an answer, and I kinda feel like a schmuck for not answering her. And I suddenly realize my mother wasn't ignoring me. She just had other things to think about and was trying really hard to preserve her sanity. Like me right about now. And her head probably felt like mine does a lot of the time. Kind of like it's going to explode because the constant chatter of a five year old sometimes sounds an awful lot like a swarm of bees has taken up residence in your brain. But at least I know where she is. That other one...the one who looks like Benny. She just silently plots against us.
And I know you're probably laughing because I still talk a lot, and you also always told me that you wished I'd have one just like me. Congratulations. I did.
So anyway, I'm sorry I didn't stop talking all those years. And one question: how long after she moves out will the buzzing stop? Will I miss it?
Love,
emmay
P.S. I guess it didn't help that her middle name happens to also be the name of the person in Benny's family who also never stops talking. (And she has halitosis, too.) So we can share the blame. Except that I picked that name (aslo his mother's name) so maybe it really is all my fault. Please spare my daughter from the halitosis.


Dear God,
Thank you for bestowing the gift of these beautiful children on me. And thank you for watching over them when they were so new and fragile. When I said I couldn't wait to hear Ruthie's voice when she was a baby, I did not realize that I actually had to specify that it was okay if she didn't use it every second that she was awake. So when my head explodes into thousands of miniscule pieces, please make sure that my daughters knew I loved them. And make sure it isn't too hard to clean up the mess.
Thank you.
Love,
emmay