My oldest son turns 4 this week. Coincidentally, I was unpacking a box this weekend with a photo album from his first year, when we lived in Mexico City. He was so small but in every picture he had this wide-eyed expression that seemed to say, “Whoa! This world is crazy.”

I don’t know if I’m the only parent with this morbid habit but on my sons’ birthdays, my mind always wanders to the question of how or even if they would remember me if I died that day. This inevitably leads me to think about what my recollections are from that age. For the first couple of years, the answer was obviously none. But around three, there are flashes, more like mental photographs than films with a narrative. But around 4 years old, the memories start to develop context. My earliest memory of this nature — I know I was 4 or 5 because of where we were living, a little bungalow in Loveland — is when I decided I was going to run away. I don’t remember what provoked this. Probably the denial of some aliment essential to my being, like ice cream. The touching and humorous part of the memory is that I decided I was going to take my younger brother with me (I couldn’t leave him in such an abusive household, after all). So I packed him clueless and grinning in my red wagon and off we went. I think I made it about two blocks before being discovered. I had some serious ’splainin’ to do.

So in answer to my question, would my 4-year-old remember me, my recollection seems to indicate that he would forget every loving, tender, nurturing thing I have done for him and remember only the time I rendered some cruelly unjust punishment, like denying him a sweet.

This strange mental exercise, far from being a downer, leaves me full of wonder for this amazing miracle called life. To think that even at 4, he is still on the very cusp of self-awareness makes me thrill over all the experiences yet to greet him. In his world, mind-blowing discoveries still lurk around every corner. I’ll never forget the first time he noticed an insect. An ant. He was enthralled, pointing at it and looking at me with that wide-eyed “Whoa!” look. That is the biggest gift (or at least one of biggest) that parenthood has to offer. Being given the chance to see the world made brand new again. To really notice a soldiering ant, a shimmering puddle, a wiggling worm. For them these moments quickly recede into the deep sea of their subconsciouses, but for us they are treasures that over the years we can pull out, dust off and hold up to the light. In doing so, we are pulling the threads of our lives and theirs together into one continuous circle. And the awe-struck child lives on in perpetuity.

After my son’s birthday in April, which we choose to take a family trip for instead of having a party, my husband asked me whether we were supposed to send thank yous for the gifts he received (most of which were from relatives and arrived by mail). My verdict was no, since, IMO, it wasn’t required by etiquette and we had thanked the givers by phone. This post on Mile High Mamas, however, has me questioning my ruling on the matter. The writer says that when she questioned on Facebook whether thank yous were really necessary, “many of my friends commiserated with me and a few burned me at the stake.”

What do you think? (Note: here’s an earlier Kid Row post that discusses whether gifts should be given at all at birthday parties).

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