Pre-wedding dinner brings back memories of little boy

Clare Marie Celano Girl Talk

Clare Marie Celano
Girl Talk

Like most little boys tell their moms, when my son was very young, he told me he wanted to marry me.

“I wish I had a tape recorder to play those words back to you when you grow up,” I’d respond.

Sitting in a beautiful waterfront restaurant in Rumson, I remembered that interaction. I remembered many things as our family sat together with the family of my son’s beautiful young bride-to-be for a “get-together dinner.”

In truth, our families have known one another for years. My son and his fiancée have been together for seven years, and it seemed a natural progression of events for them to marry, although as with all relationships, there were rough spots along the way.

On my way home from the dinner, my son sent me a text message on my phone.

“You seemed upset all night, ma, are you OK?” the message said.

I love this boy so very much. My daughters didn’t even pick up on my tumbled emotions, but for some reason, he did.

I texted him back and said I just missed his father, my late ex-husband, who passed away a little over a year ago. And that is very true. I missed his father’s presence at that dinner. He would have loved it – the conversation, the food, the interaction. His father was a people person and was always very comfortable in the presence of others, and he would have been proud and happy to sit with his son and the girl he felt was the right one for him.

His absence at that event was deafening, and my son and his sisters felt it.

But as I sat there in that restaurant, observing the beautiful view of the rippling Navesink River at sunset, I realized I missed more than my son’s father. I also missed my little boy.

“How did we ever get from there to here,” I would have asked his father had he been sitting beside me. I don’t feel that much older, and yet 28 years have gone by since we brought that little bundle all wrapped up in fluffy blue blankets to our home.

His father would have smiled and said something like, “I know how you feel, babe. I feel the same way.”

And although he rarely indulged in emotional displays of feelings, I would have felt both his joy and his acknowledgment of the rapid passage of time in our son’s life.

My son and I were very close as he was growing up. As a youngster, he seemed more comfortable relating to my personality. He had a sensitive side that I made a point to encourage – sometimes much to the chagrin of his father.

I’d been in this place of remembering several years ago, questioning the rapid passing of time in the months preceding my daughter’s wedding. I went through this same tumble of emotions, remembering Barbie dolls, lacy pink dresses, pink gingham bed linens, snuggly hugs, but somehow, this was different.

You know what they say, “A son is a son until he takes a wife, but a daughter is a daughter for the rest of her life.”

My future daughter-in-law is like one of my own kids. We have a wonderful, close relationship, and I never expect that to change. Nonetheless, a tinge of something, fear? confusion? and the deafening question, “Is he ready?” loomed over me.

I also felt a deep sadness for the boy left behind.

The decision to marry, although not really changing anything tangible about the child, nonetheless changes so much. Whether it’s a passage-of-time reality check, or just concrete evidence that your child is no longer a child, saying “yes” to marriage get a parent’s full attention when the decision to take the leap of faith finally arrives.

There’s a great scene in “Father of the Bride,” when Steve Martin looks across the dinner table at his 18-year-old daughter who has just announced that she is getting married. In his mind’s eye, she is no longer 18 but appears about 6 years old. A similar scene appears in one of “The Nanny” episodes when Fran Drescher’s mother bids her 30-something daughter good night on the eve of her wedding day. Cuddled up in a comforter in her old bedroom in her mother’s house, Fran has also become a 6-year-old on screen, saying good night to her mommy. The age or gender of the child really has nothing to do with these feelings. And I defy any parent to watch either of these scenes and not feel a momentary sadness and loss for what is gone.

So yes, I saw my son as a bridegroom – a handsome, strong, smart and sensitive hardworking man with a bright future at that dinner. I saw him as the wonderful father he already is to his 9-year-old son.

But looking out at the river, I also saw the blond curls of a 4-year-old as he slept in a yellow fleece sleeper on my sofa. I heard the words “Read me just one more story before I go to bed, Mommy, please?” I felt the softness of chubby arms reaching around my neck in a precious hug and the smoothness of a cheek that lay against my own, while the tiniest voice said, “I love you, Mommy.”

I remembered all his firsts – his first bicycle, his first fight, his first girlfriend, his first broken heart, his first car, his senior prom, the birth of his first child.

Even though my son has been an adult for quite a while, marriage will move him into another part of adulthood. He’s ready to give up the toys and the games of childhood now. He is a man who is taking a wife and I in turn must learn to let go as well. And as I watched the water and the gentle ripples of the river moving over one another, it now made sense. When you’re ready, you’re ready, and the decision is easy and effortless, just like the movements of the rippling water.

And as I watched him laughing and joking at the dinner, just as his father would have done, so enjoying the evening his future mother-in-law planned in the couple’s honor, I realized that whatever turmoil once plagued him seemed to have disappeared. He was ready. And those three words alleviated my concerns and worries.

Like a split screen in a movie, I allowed my mind another look at the curly-headed toddler in the yellow sleeper, then looked to the image of the handsome young man that toddler had become, dressed in a black tuxedo with a white rose in his lapel.

With a quiet sigh, I turned back to the guests, away from the water and whispered to myself, “Let go, Mom, your son is ready to take the next step on his life’s path – just the way he’s supposed to.”

Clare Marie Celano is a staff writer for Greater Media Newspapers. She can be reached at [email protected].