Butterflies...

We have our first real boyfriend.  My oldest daughter, at the very same age that I was and who has never been one to settle, has met the first boy to put that look in her eye and smile on her face, which I recognize all too well.  This is the real deal.  This is the one who must have that extra something that she has been patiently holding out for since she decided she wanted a boyfriend, but not just any boyfriend.  This is the one that could break her heart.  This is the one that she will learn many hard lessons from.  This is the one who I will be watching like a hawk, making sure he is worthy.  

We picked him up for our first date…I mean their first date. And as we got closer and closer to his house, we were both trying to talk each other out of our tummy aches (which, in the moment, my jaded heart hadn’t recognized as very special and exciting butterflies.).  He was a sweet boy, with a lovely family and their adorable family dog.   I couldn’t help thinking, when I met them all, how lucky they were to meet her. 

I’ve put everything I have into raising her with enough confidence and patience to hold out for extra special and to be worthy of it and appreciative of it when she finds it.  My girl has some sky high standards these days and I knew that boy must be extra special. (He better be. My girl is a gem.)  It wasn’t lost on me, the way he looked at her, like he couldn’t believe his eyes.  And the way he smiled and floated on air around her, just as I have been watching my giddy daughter float lately.  

So far, she tells me a lot about him and them (like when they had the “are we boyfriend/girlfriend?” talk and she reminded him that he hadn’t asked her yet, but that he was welcome to ask her next time they saw each other in person.  My Girl.)  It’s not the usual “Whatever, it’s not important, don’t worry about it” (aka “none of your business mom”).   It IS important.  And it’s exciting and new and a start of a magical/horrific dating lifetime filled with heavenly highs and gut wrenching lows.  It’s a new chapter for us.  And I want to know EVERYTHING.  I won’t know everything.  But I want to.  I want her to not be able to stop talking about him, and I want to hang on her every word.  And in very grateful return,  I will try not to gush and choke up everytime I see that twinkle in her eye (because I guess that’s lame), and I will try to keep my very wise opinions  to myself…as much as I possibly can.  Lines of communication can be very fragile at this age.

A few weeks after our first date… I mean their first date, they went to his Homecoming dance together.  He bought three different ties just to make sure he had the perfect color to match her dress, which I thought was really adorable (and smart, because in all honesty, perfection is pretty much what I’m looking for, for my girl).   We stood in his living room, with his family, and took pictures of our children, who were positivley glowing.  Everytime I look at that picture, I am so thankful for that huge, genuinely happy smile on her face, and so impressed that his smile may be even bigger.  

I've learned to embrace the butterflies I get evertime I see them together.  Now if I could just convince her to introduce him to her three precious little siblings.