April 14th, 2007

Dear Luke,

Isn't it wonderful? Spring, I mean. It's lovely. It's like everything in the world seems to wake up and come out of whatever deep depression it's landed itself in. There are these flowers I noticed as I took Caleb out on a walk yesterday. He was cooing away in his stroller, like a lovely little melody so I didn't have to look like one of thse actual exercising women who wear walkmen or walk around with their MP3 players on their arm. Listening to him reminds me of who I am sometimes. I'm his mother. I'm your wife. I'm me and that's all I ever wanted.

I was telling you about these flowers. Do you remember when Rory and I used to come for Thanksgiving and we'd bring you flowers? You'd always crab and we'd argue about how you don't like flowers but I always bring you them. I loved that little tradition. I always brought you the same kind of flowers I'd picked out for Mrs. Kim and Sookie, but the truth is that when I was deciding which flowers would be best, I wasn't thinking of them. I was imagining that one little moment just after you took your first bite of turkey or green beans or shoved the marshmallows off your sweet potatotes when you'd glance over at the counter and smile only slightly. Did you ever know that I watched for that? Now you can finally admit it, you liked the flowers. Maybe it wasn't them per say that you liked, maybe it was more that I gave you flowers. That thought would burn inside of me when I imagined that look on your face back in Doose's.

You'd think I'd have realized my feelings for you all the way back then. You'd think I'd have realized that I was more excited to give you the flowers than to eat that delectable pumpkin pie you always made. I think I'm an unobservant fool.

And again I back track back to those flowers Caleb and I saw on our walk. Yes, I can say for sure that he saw them because your darling boy proceeded to try to rip them out of the ground. It was cute and I didn't want to freak but I feared getting yelled at in a language I couldn't possibly understand. And it wouldn't be the first time, I mean, Rory told you about that French fry/freedom fry incident. And Graciela, I swear she's a godsend, always jumping in to help when a guest at the inn starts complaining and the words 'parle vue anglais' slip out of my head. She really is nothing like Michel. I'm wondering if he'd be interested in a foreign exchange program for receptionists. But then, technically, he'd be returing home, so I'd guess not.

You know, when I think about moving home, I realize that there are things, places, people that I'm going to miss. I'd never change my mind. I could never be happier than in that blue house with you and Caleb. But there will be a trace of nostalgia running through me.

I mean, I don't want you thinking that this time in Paris was all that bad. I'm in Paris for Pete's sake! How could that be bad?

Seriously, I thought I was getting better at the tangentiality thing. Then again… maybe not. These flowers, though they were something. They…. I should look them up and see if it's possible that Babette could come over and plant them in our garden. I mean, you know as well as I that my favorite flower is the white lily. But I'm now considering changing that. Maybe the red whatchamaycalits are my favorites. And I'm sure you're wondering why I'm telling you about flowers. I'm wondering that as well.

But I got a call from April the other day. Did she tell you that? I guess she's thrilled that you're going to New Mexico to see her for her birthday instead of coming here to celebrate mine. She wanted to thank me for agreeing to that. You didn't tell her I suggested it?

If you're going to be so frustrating, will you at least warn me so that I've already got an answer together when your almost fourteen year old daughter calls?

How did she get my number anyways? It's not that I mind but she's been calling every once in awhile since you and I became woman and husband. I know I told you about it. And I'm just as sure that Anna has no idea. And yet that part of me that wants to tell Anna because a mother should know everything about her daughter is completely overshadowed by the part of me that is just so excited to get to know your daughter.

Did you ever really just observe April? Did you ever reflect back on Rory and compare her to April and wonder if the combination of them is going to be Caleb's future?

There's so much about our son that excites me. I can't wait for his first word. His first step. The first time he realizes he should be using the word 'no'. The first time he falls asleep in his big boy bed. So much. So many firsts. And then, yet, I want him to stay little forever. I just want him to be this little boy I can wrap in my arms and hold close to me, feeling his warm pink skin against mine. I think I can feel how much he loves me. You'd think I'd be used to it, I watched my daughter grow up. But I think I couldn't wait for Rory to grow up. I couldn't wait to see the person she was going to be.

This is besides the fact that her growing up was actually my growing up.

Anyways, I do think it's a good decision we made, to have you go spend April's birthday with her. A fourteenth birthday is so much more important than a thirty-ninth. (And when I say thirty-nine, I mean thirty-one of course.) Although I will miss my five hours of housework as my present. I have to admit, you in that t-shirt and tool belt – totally the best part of the five hours.

Hold on… I think I just drooled on your letter.

You know, people say you're supposed to be scared about turning forty. How do I tell them that I'm more excited about my fortieth birthday than my thirty-ninth? For my fortieth, I'll be able to celebrate back at home with you and Caleb or even if not at home, then in New Mexico with April as well. I don't really care.

Can you believe it? Can you believe all we have? Just more and more every day I realize how much we have. When I come home in May, everything's just going to be so perfect. You. Me. Caleb. The girls. Our house. I'm not sure I ever thought I could be this happy. I grew up in a world where a new pair of pearls was the most exciting thing on earth and I just remember thinking it was the little things that I was going to have to look forwards to throughout my life. The few smiles I received from my father. The few times my mother didn't berate me for one thing or another. The times when I hid away in my room to just finally have the ability to be myself.

I never thought I would ever be loved like you love me. I never thought that someone would be able to look at me and just get me, just appreciate every little thing about me, even my little annoyances. You know, as Rory grew up, I dated a bit but I didn't really care about the guys, I really would have rather just stayed home with Rory and chilled because I thought that the only person who would ever love me fully and completely was her. Those guys were nothing in comparison to my little girl. But then you came along and changed all that.

I'm not sure what you could give me for my birthday that could ever compare to everything you've given me in the past year. Our son. Our house. Your eternal devotion. I'm not sure what I could possibly wish on when I blow out the candles on my cake that could ever make me happier than I will be the first moment I step off that plane to finally return home to never leave again and throw myself into your arms.

I've been think about that lately – the whole leaving here kinda thing. Mike introduced me to Gloria the other day, the woman he hired to take my spot when I leave in just a little over a month. She's nice, very intrigued by the changes I made to get our numbers up, but I was standing at the reception desk a little later watching her go over something with Phillipe and it just hit me, this is coming to an end.

And to me, sometimes, it's like it's all just beginning.

And when it was really just beginning I was so lost that I don't know how I got my act together enough to turn this inn around the way I have. Right now thinking back on that time, that person I was then, I'm still angry. I've forgiven so much, I've learned to understand why I did what I did that night and learned to live with fact that though I can't change it, at least I've learned from it. Maybe we both did.

But you know what I'm still mad about? I left.

I thought the days of cut-and-run Lorelai were over. I thought once we got together I wasn't going to just end things and freak out when I felt my hand was too close to the flame. And I didn't. Not at all. But the moment things got rough, instead of hanging around and trying to deal with things, I ran. I packed my bags and came all the way across the ocean to keep from sorting things out.

That was stupid. Really stupid.

When I finally got here, starting working and set up my apartment and realized just how far away I really was, I realized how much I already missed you and my life and just everything. I remember that day I'd finished unpacking in that old apartment Mike had set me up in before I realized I was pregnant with Caleb, I set up a few pictures, I put the ring box in the drawer of the nightstand and I glanced around and the place just felt so empty. I'm not sure how. I'm not sure why. But everything felt lifeless. I think that's when everything hit me, that I'd walked away, that that night had actually happened, that I'd come all the way over here.

I remember sitting on the floor next to my bed, my knees bunched up to my chest and just sobbing. I remember the phone was next to me and every time I looked at it the only person I could think of to call was you and I couldn't do that anymore. It was so frustrating that you were the one person I had always turned to when it all fell apart and that time it was because it all fell apart that I couldn't go to you.

And there I was, in the middle of Paris, an ocean away from home and anything I had ever known in my entire life and it was all because I ran like a scare little girl.

Well I'm not running anymore. The only place I'll ever run at this moment is back home, back to that beautiful blue house with my beautiful husband and my beautiful son.

You know what's nice, somehow I feel that this year when I blow out my candles, I can be pretty positive I'll get exactly what I wish for. And actually, I've already gotten what I wished for last year. Funny how things work out.

From your 29 year old wife,

Lorelai