Dear Nancy Tillman,
My hope is you get hundreds, if not thousands, of letters like this, from grateful parents like myself. Parents who read their children your eloquent rhymes each night, turning the pages of your stunning illustrations, watching their imaginations run wildly into sweet dreams.
Parents, who like myself this evening, find themselves convinced that like the magic P.L. Travers created in Mary Poppins, know you didn’t just craft those stories for their children. Because even though your stories teach such valuable lessons to our children, as I read the words out loud each night, inflecting as I expect you hoped a parent would, emphasizing each important phrase, I hear you whispering in my ear to listen to what I’m saying.
As I work my way through “The Night You Were Born”, watching my son’s eyes anticipate when I will turn the page to when the bears will “dance until dawn”, smiling with such satisfaction in the merriment of the animals, I rest on the memory of how our hearts danced until dawn the night he was born, erasing the moments he took a stamp and “painted the walls” only hours earlier that evening.
When I take on your next book, “Wherever You Are”, and tell the story of how “I wanted you more than you will ever know, so I sent love to follow wherever you go”, I lock eyes with my wife each time, acknowledging in that moment, the three years of IUIs and IVF it took to start our family, savoring in everything we’ve created together, erasing any of the disagreement we had with each other that day by the time I’ve reached the page where you wrote, “my promise to you, is you’re never alone”.
If the twins are still awake after two of your books, the third to be read is usually “I’d Know You Anywhere, My Love”. As a parent to special needs, the message of “so if you decide to be different one day, no worries… I’d know you anyway”, provides such comforting reassurance each time. We have no idea who our children will be, but we stand by the promise to each of them that you close out with, of “whatever it is you imagine to be, I’ll just be so proud you belong to me.” In that moment each time, you hold me accountable to remember what my child can and can’t do, and the role I play in their lives as their advocate, their support, and their coach, their teacher, their cheerleader, and friend.
Tonight, as their eyes got heavier, I made it through only the first few pages of “You’re Here for a Reason”, where you remind readers that “you’re here for a reason, you certainly are, the world would be different without you by far,” tackling only a few more pages before they finally fell asleep. I lingered on the page for a moment, but then continued to read: “Life can be tricky, there isn’t a doubt, you’ll skin your knees trying to figure it out.” A tear trickled down my cheek. As I listened to the words I’ve practically memorized by now, it reminds me that even on the hardest days where I think I have no idea what I’m doing as a parent, that “to somebody else, you’ll always be strong.”
So, thank you, Nancy Tillman. Thank you for the amazing books that teach such important lessons to both children and parents.
*Oh, and thank you for including so many gorgeous illustrations, especially with the birds… they are my son’s favorite. - XO, Christina Young