Planting Charlie's Roots

More than ten years ago, I read a Barbra Kingsolver novel in which the family practiced the tradition of burying the umbilical cord stumps of their newborn babies under a newly planted tree. For some reason, that resonated deeply within me, and I have remembered it ever since. For years, I have had this idea tucked away in the back of my mind as something I would like to do with my children.

I don't know, (and can't find) what the real tradition is, or from which culture it originates, but to me, this is symbolic of us planting Charlie's roots. Especially given the details of the way our son came to us, I feel this is one way we can honor his beginnings. To me it simply didn't feel right to throw away his umbilical cord stump - his final connection to the woman who gave him life. Instead, we planted his "roots" under the new rose bush he gave me this year for my first Mother's Day.

I know that Charlie's life will take him all sorts of places, and indeed I hope our son will grow far from here throughout his lifetime. Our wish is not to hold him here, but rather to help him become the kind of man that knows he has roots deep in the love of home, so that he never forgets where he came from, and so he knows there is always a place to which he can return.