A Letter to My Little Girl

Sometimes, life has a way of doing a back flip, and landing right on your head. It has been a few months since I've seen you, and it may be longer until I can again. I worry about you every day, you're always on my mind... that never changes. You're still little, but you're not as little as you used to be; part of me is scared that your memory of me has faded away. God only knows... I miss you more than I have ever missed anyone.

When you were born, I started writing to you in a journal. I had a plan to speak to you while we were the same age. You were born when I was 20, and I was going to give you the journal when you turned 20. Then what happened between your mother and I happened, and I lost that journal in a storage unit with the rest of my personal belongings. It is honestly something I have never really been able to get over. So I am writing you again... This will be my way of speaking to you while we are apart. Although, hopefully that will not be for much longer.

I want you to know that I failed you... You see I made you a promise when you were younger, one that at the time I truly believed I had the capability to keep. Finding out that I could not was one of the most humbling experiences I have ever been through. I wanted to apologize to you for that, and I hope you know that I did everything I could... It just wasn't enough.

As much anger as I have for your mother for the way things turned out, I will always love her. Unfortunately, she doesn't love me like that anymore, and so as much as that hurts... your dad needs to make peace with it, and move on. Now the only thing that concerns me is seeing your face again, and sooner rather than later.

I am counting down the days until we are together again... we have so many adventures to go on together! I want you to grow up like I did, with a curiosity about the word. I am going to take you fishing, camping, mountain hiking, you name it. We are going to see the world together; I want to be able to give you a globe, and take you anywhere that you place your tiny finger. I want you to never stop learning, and to always question everything, even me. I get overly-anxious just thinking about all the years we still have together. One of the first things we are going to do is fly to Alaska, so you can really see the stars and maybe even the northern lights. I have never seen them myself, so witnessing them for the first time together will be something neither of us will ever forget.

Look at me... day dreaming about the future... I have to say, watching you grow up is the motivation that keeps me from giving up. There have been days that I've been on the verge of quitting on life itself, but you, Gabriella, you keep me going. You are what keeps the fire inside of my soul burning brightly. You are the ultimate force behind the pure will that I have to do something great... something the entire world will remember, including you!

Sometimes I wonder if you are going to be anything like me. Regardless of who you grow up to be, I will always love, I really need you to know that. If you read this one day, and come away from it having learned anything at all... I truly hope that it is that simple fact. You will forever, and always be the single most important thing in my life. Every move I make, I make to give you a better life. There is a song from Eminem I used to listen to when I was younger. It's called Mockingbird, hopefully I can show it to you when you're older. Basically the song is dedicated to his daughter, and one of the last lyrics to the song go like this...

No more worries rest your head and go to sleep, maybe one day we'll wake up and this will all just be a dream.

I love you Gabriella and I promise daddy is going to see you very soon.