The First Country You Learn is Home

If you’re new to Raising Myles, Welcome!

I write letters to my newborn son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, below are some good places to start:

• Starting Daycare: I Never Knew it Would be this Hard

• I used to be a Plant Dad

• How I Met Your Mother

• A Letter From Your Mother

It is Labor Day today here in the States, and I am missing all the tastes of Brooklyn—Crown Heights, Flatbush, and the Stuy, to be exact. But writing this reminds me that home is not always a place — home is where the people you love are.

You, the front room, the family portrait (drawn by Uncle Wsly)

14 Months

Dear Myles,

The first country you learn is here at home. Where there is nothing you can do to separate us from our love. 

. The meals are endless, and the food is plenty. We pour over you tirelessly and endlessly. The government here is truly built on trusting God and love. In this country, the one we call home, your mistakes are welcomed, encouraged, and inconsequential. In this country, you are not even Black; you are beautiful. Your skin radiates under the touch of the sun, and at night, its fullness remains the same. In this home, you see yourself in every book, person, and even cartoon if we allow it. So much so, you gaze at men with translucent skin with wonder, as if something is missing in them.

There is no war here; you are shielded from the heat pressing upon the doors, windows, and walls. The world is on fire, but this home is an oasis—this is your Eden. 

Life is about service. We serve each other because it is our duty. We are stewards; what we have is not our own. We were given what we have not because we deserve it, but because of God’s grace. We give a tenth of what we earn, say a word of thanks before we eat, and pray before we sleep. We only want more to give more. 

Love is not something you have to earn or learn; it is something you have seen, heard, smelled, felt, and even tasted.

You are safe here, not just in this house, this home, but in our arms.

We live in America, our house is in Alabama, but you live at home.

I love you, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Love, 

Daddy 

Appreciation Time: Thank you Bill for signing up to be a paid subscriber. I appreciate you so much!

These letters are a labor of love. All funds collected from writing these letters go toward Myles' college savings. A paid subscription also gives you access to all letters I’ve written to Myles, including these letters I write every other week or so, where I explore fatherhood more deeply, discuss my own upbringing, and reflect on what it means to be raising a Black son.

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. What does "home" mean to you?

2. When do you feel least at home?

3. Tell me about something you recently ate that you would love to have again.

4. Do you believe love is something that must be earned?

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Looking for more writing from Black, Global Indigenous, and People of Color on Substack? Earlier this week Earlier this week, the Locked In community published its first issue of Unlocked | BIPOC Reads . This issue was beautifully curated by my friend

Noha Beshir

and edited by be and

Zefan

.

Issue #03: Unlocked

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Want more of Myles’ Letters?

These are Subscriber’s favorites:

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love