A Mental Photo

She stood there. Naked. Delighted.
Her shoulders were slightly raised; arms up in the air with open palms.
She had a quizzical smirk on her face.
The drops poured down on over her pigtails.
She must have just realized what it was-- it wasn't just about being wet.
It was a shower of drops.
They must have tickled because she kind of giggled.

The golden evening light in the pool shower made the moment even more magical.

It was an image I thought to myself, "This is one of those moment you will try and remember for your lifetime. When it was just her and nobody else. "

I will try to remember when you were just one, and it was just the three of us at the pool on a Sunday afternoon. I will try and remember that you were only two tiles high. I will try and remember when it was the mere magic of a shower that delighted you.

As Emily's time to leave for Africa approaches and I spend these days here at work away from Kate, I think very much about mothering and "sending off" children. I am sad only because I know my turn as a mother will come one day to say goodbye too. I am sad only because as mother, a little more space widens between us and our children every single day--they crawl, then they walk, then they ride away... It is like we stand as mothers with a magnifier focused intently on their joy and pain and then they naturally move away a little bit at a time farther from us. The space is a sweeter, more sorrowful, and fuller experience than I have ever known. It is an irreplaceable joy.