THE COMMANDER

by Shelli Centra

Our children pass through stages seamlessly. They grow in leaps and bounds, but we never see them change from day to day. Every once in a while, unexpectedly, something hurtles us out of the here and now, back into "remember when." It happened to me yesterday, when a casual remark by my six year old suddenly reminded me of an era in his preschool days that I had sworn never to forget -- and had forgotten completely.

This time I'm writing it down.

The Commander came into our life when Benjamin was three or four. Seen only by Ben, he lived in the crawl space under our house, and occasionally lifted us up into outer space by means of a series of computers and rockets and other scientific stuff. Ben made few decisions without consulting The Commander, and The Commander would always be available to explain things to Ben. We became accustomed to hearing The Commander's views and opinions on everything that we did, and everywhere we went.

I loved The Commander. He gave me some incredible insights into the workings of Ben's mind. By listening to The Commander's comments, I was able to better understand what my little boy feared, hoped for, understood of the world and was concerned about. After a while, I took The Commander for granted, and somehow never noticed when the references to him lessened and then stopped. Yesterday, when Ben casually mentioned that The Commander was building robots in the crawl space, I suddenly realized it had been so long since I had heard those words, that the unthinkable had happened--I had actually forgotten The Commander ever existed.

I suddenly saw Ben as both the precious, fragile preschooler he had been and the independent, sturdy first grader he now was. And seeing the difference made my heart ache, and made me wonder about the changes that are inevitably ahead. I wanted to stop time, and give myself the chance to touch and to marvel at what was mine today, and what would soon only be my memory.

Ben has no patience for hugs and kisses. He is annoyed by my "mushy" stuff. I turned to his three-year-old brother Jacob, who still glories in the attention of my affection. So I kissed and squeezed and snuggled, and tried hard to remember what I don't ever want to forget.