I listened to my daughter practice her presentation from the hallway

Dear Delyara, She didn’t know I had stopped there. She was in her room reading it out loud to herself, then again, then changing a sentence, then starting over in that determined voice children use when they are nervous but trying to become bigger than the nerves. I stood in the hallway and listened without moving. It made me emotional for reasons I couldn’t immediately explain. Maybe because I could hear her building herself. Maybe because I remembered being young and frightened and wanting so badly to do well. Maybe because motherhood is full of these hidden audience moments where your heart sits outside a door and watches someone you love become more of themselves without you being allowed to hold the process directly. I didn’t interrupt. I just listened until she stopped. That felt like love in one of its quieter forms.