My Parents
Day 27
Nothing beats the joy of being my parents’ daughter. Even in the next life, I’d still choose them.
I say it because whatever we’ve been through together, good or hard, was always held by two people who wanted my life to be better than theirs was, and I don’t think I understood the weight of that until much later than I should have.
Between the two of them, I grew up inside an unconditional love. I’m only now old enough to understand how much of a gift it actually was, disguised for years as something ordinary.
My parents have known me for longer than I have known myself.
They knew me before the confidence, before the ambition, before the career plans, before I became the Lilian or Da. Lily, y’all see. They knew the little girl, and they have had front-row seats to every version since.
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They have seen me excited about something and then completely lose interest in it. They have watched me make decisions, change my mind, get things wrong, get things right, start over, and try again. They gave me a room and multiple chances to be it all. And somehow, I have never had to earn my way back into being their daughter.
I am grateful for the things they gave me, but even more for their presence that gave me a sense of belonging. The confidence of knowing that somewhere in this world, I have people who genuinely want me to be okay.
I also think about how their love has aged alongside me, shifting shape as I’ve grown, without ever losing its core. It doesn’t look now the way it looked when I was seven. There’s more conversation now, more mutual respect, occasionally even role reversal, moments where I find myself checking in on them the way they used to check in on me. But underneath all that change, the same steady thing has stayed exactly where it always was, holding everything else together.
The older I get, the more I understand that my parents were not simply raising a child. They were raising a person they hoped would have a life bigger, freer and perhaps easier than the one they had known. Some of the things I call ordinary now were probably sacrifices to them then.
So today, I am grateful for my mother and my father. For their life. For everything they have carried and everything they have given. Most of all, I am grateful that I get to know them as individuals, love them, and experience this life with them.
🎵 Music Note: Counting My Blessings by Seph Schlueter
Some days, the list writes itself.😊
Love,
Da. Lily❤️
