Saturday, July 23, 2005
Intimate Knowledge (of a new kind!)
I have never known any person as intimately as I know Emma. I have known her since before she was born. Our introduction was alarming for both of us I suppose. She had lost the world she had known; warm, comforting and secure. I was given the awesome responsibility of taking care of this new person, armed with no real tools except instinct and the books I didn't have time to read.

Since that time I have come to know every inch of her body. Her flawless skin, marred only by the scratches she gives herself with her little toenails. Her fine cornsilk hair, which seems to grow overnight. Her blue, blue eyes, which still amaze me in their unlikelihood. I know her moods, her signals, her sounds. I don't claim to know her mind. That will always be unfathomable.

I point all this out not to gag you with schmaltz, but to press the point that when she does something new I notice it. That's what is so exciting about this phase of development. Every day seems to hold something new, some new achievement, some new discovery that Emma has made.

So what was it that she did today that makes me wax so rhapsodic? She discovered her hair. She learned that when she strokes her hair it feels good. But she doesn't just reach right up and pet herself. She uses a wide sweeping motion and ends with an articulated motion of her fingers. It makes me giggle to watch her.

Of course I took the opportunity to point out to her that she is welcome to pull her own hair instead of mommy's now.
Written at 9:22 PM by Highlandgal.
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