Other times it was a walk, a scoot, a dwardle and a climb.

In the early days, your eyes would search for me in the playground and light up when I was found. “Mummy!” you would cry and you would sprint into my arms.

More recently my eyes would search for you, bag adrift and tie awry, a giggle down Oxford Road with a gaggle of friends.

Sometimes, I would be distracted and hasty. A call from work. An engrossing thought. A resentment of the 3.30pm curfew that cut across productive afternoons.

Other times I would gaze at you on the road ahead and feel again that first amazement: “Are you really my son? Are you really my boy?”

Each day would bring a different conversation, each day a different mood. But the route was well-trodden and the rituals were clear: hiding in the wasteland, crossing with the lolly-pop man, looking for the ice cream van, climbing along the handrail by the neighbourhood office, walking along the Silver Street wall…

One day, amongst the demands of work and requests to play with friends, we walked home together for the last time. When that day was, I cannot say but today is your last day at primary school so that day has passed, for sure.

And so I grieve. I mourn the interruption: the gazing, the scooting and the dwardling. I feel the loss of the small, repeated acts of ordinariness – the 10p sweets and muddle of bags.

Thank you for the school run, my son. Celebrate. Enjoy. Take pride in growing up. And please also know that whatever your day, someone is waiting for you. Wherever you play, there’s someone who delights in you. However you meander, you’re being brought safely home.

One day I shall look back at this time

At the waiting

And the counting

And the bleeding

And the longing

The trying

And the not-trying

The loving

And forgiving

And I will say that it made sense.

I know the time will come again

When my womb will be holding

The secret hope,

The possibility of miracle,

Origins so awesome

That only God can know.

But today my vulva

Is tender-lipped

Heralding blood.

And today is the day

I have to live

Right now

Learning to embrace

My own body and grieving dreams

With the fierce

Unconditional

Over-whelming

Mother’s love

That is present

That is ready

That is now.

But that’s the thing about the Library of Birmingham, which opens on Tuesday 3 September 2013 – it isn’t a library in the sense that we have always known it.

It IS a library.  It still is unique amongst UK libraries for the depth and range of its collections, six of which have been designated “outstanding” by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council.  You will still be able to go in to look something up or borrow a book.

BUT, as well as being a place for books, it is also a garden, a recording studio, a theatre, a concert hall, a board room, a coffee shop, a viewing point. (I would have taken photos of all of those things to show you, but the garden’s the only thing that’s ready at the moment.)

Architect Francine Houben calls it the “people’s palace.” I like that description but it doesn’t quite work for me because I don’t know what one does in a palace, except walk quietly down the corridors and be on one’s best behaviour.

I prefer to think of it as the “people’s playground” – a place where you arrive and think : “Oooh, look we could play pirates over there.   Or shall we go down here and pretend to be hobbits? But I want to play on the swings first.  Hey, look!  Let’s make a den over there.”

The Library of Birmingham is opening soon. Palace of playground, get ready for something you have never experienced before.

• I am a Face of the Library of Birmingham and one of its Ambassadors. This post is the first in a series of four that I wrote after going inside the building for the first time in July 2013.

“Now darling,” I said.  “There’s something you need to learn and it’s very important.

“When somebody gives you a present, you must say: ‘Thank you very much’ whatever you think of it.  Even if you don’t like it, even if you’ve already got it, remember the people who gave it to you have been thoughtful and kind – so thank them.”

Learning to say thank you

I had no faith in Arch’s ability to learn this lesson so, at his party, I was in full control-mode whisking presents out of his hand to avert social calamities. “We’re having far too much fun to open them now, aren’t we?”

The crunch came a few days later when friends dropped by with a late present for Arch and we had no reason (pretend or otherwise) not to open it there and then in front of them.

Arch eagerly tore at the wrappings. It was Mr Men pants. I curled my toes – too young for him, not his thing, nothing he could play with…. What was Arch going to say?

“Thank you very much,” he said,  confidently looking my friends in the eye.

Afterwards I sat Arch on my knee and told him how proud I was of what he had done.

“Yes,” he said. “I thought I was going to like the present – but I didn’t. It was boring.”

Learning to put on a mask

“It was,” I said, “but you learnt something very important about not hurting people’s feelings.  I’m really proud of you darling. Well done.”

But as I said the words, I felt my heart contract.

If what Arch has learnt was so good and useful – why had it made me sad?