The Girl Who Learned To Kneel

Dear Elsie,

You are very nearly a year and a half, and I feel quite panicked about chronicling the time since my last letter.

Daddy is more calm. And so wise. Every time I say I’m sad because you’re growing up so fast, he is quick to say, ‘No sadness! Just enjoy.’ What a lovely perspective. So the fact that I never managed to get the video camera out to record you saying ‘meow’ with a melodious lilt is not sad. It was just a beautiful moment in your development which I release. I feel so mature. (Now I should probably go rail at the Gods for my loss, ’cause how is being that mature possibly interesting? Just wondering.)

But back to all the other bits I have been itching to record. For starters, all of a sudden you find rhyme funny. So the book about the twenty-six bunnies with rhyming names makes you hysterical. I totally agree. Zed going to bed is funny. Ute sleeping with fruit. Funnier still.

Not to mention your ever expanding vocabulary, all ending with the letter ‘k.’ Let me be specific: milk, walk, book, stuck, truck and then, of course, bu…aka bus. The ‘s’ sound is still in development. But boy will that be liberating when the ‘s’ flows off your lips, because you certainly do love buses (a mere sighting has the capacity to completely transform your mood), and things in the plural form. Like more than one raisin. More than one banana chip. More than one marker. More than one tampon. (Those things are neat to chew on, eh?)

And then of course I should mention some of our encounters: the crossing guards you charm with your waving; the store clerks who delight in your laughter; the servers who respond to your indoor snow angels with a sense of humour (’cause Hanks on Church street has a kick-ass ceiling worthy of your eagle eye inspection.) Then there are those who don’t appreciate the nuances of your personality. Like the woman at our local coffee shop who said ‘hi.’ You being on the tired side responded with, ‘No,’ at which point the woman got all sore. One would have hoped that a person’s self-esteem was sufficiently rooted at the ripe age of seventy-five to be immune to a baby’s moods. But in this case, apparently not. She turned to me on the way out, ‘You’re a saint. One day she will be a treasure.’

We redeemed the moment with an sucker, ’cause everything is better with a sucker when you’re 18 months. And actually 29.

A treasure one day? Oh Elsie Pants, you are a treasure now. Daddy and I actually lie in bed and talk about what a treasure you are. Is that sappy? Does our devotion embarrass you? Nah! Let’s just enjoy this moment with the rhyming and the buses and your hot pink snowsuit almost black from the many surfaces it has seen, and of course, the letter ‘k.’

Love love, Mama