Just Write {68}

There are lines in the wood on the bedside table. Just one small area with slight scratches in a circle, from the bottom of my tea cup. There’s another deeper and lighter scratch from Elsie pulling my mug across the tabletop right as I said oooh, don’t touch.

These lines are familiar now, a place to set my tea cup every night when I climb under the covers to read.

I notice that bigger and deeper scratch on the table sometimes. I think of Elsie. The way she climbs and pulls everything off of things and is so fearless and yes, defiant. I smile, even though it’s not easy sometimes, these days with a toddler so fierce. This girl is mighty and she will let you know with her roar. Then she’ll come close and put her head on your lap while softly saying aaahhhh. This is the only way she has to say she’s sorry for the outburst.

She shouts when we’re in the car, saying a different version of aaah ah aaaah until we remember that all she wants is music. Loud.

Every night she chats non-words to herself for about an hour before falling asleep. She’s all done being nursed and then all done even being rocked for a few minutes before transitioning to her crib. There it is, suddenly, the end of the baby stage. She has thrown us all straight into the little girl days. Her Daddy and I are both a bit stunned, looking back and forward at once, heads shaking.

She still pulls the baby game of losing her pacifier on purpose, tossing it out of the crib and then calling Mama Mama Mama…then she laughs when I come through the door and I reach around in the dark, my hand brushing over too much wood floor under-the-crib dust until I bump the paci, snatch it up, pop it in and tell her no more.

Sometimes it happens again and again and then there’s stillness and quiet. I miss the nursing and the rocking.

And I’m loving the new girl with the baby girl inside us both, always.

:::

This is the 68th installment of Just Write, an exercise in free writing your ordinary and extraordinary moments. {Please see the details here.} I would love to read your freely written words so join me and link up below. You can add the url of your post at any time. Just be sure it’s a link to your Just Write post, not to your main page, and please don’t link to posts that are not freely written in the spirit of capturing moments–you know, don’t link to how-to lists or sponsored posts. I am far from a jerk, but I want people to remember that this is about writing and not about traffic. If you’re linking to everything you’ve found to link to that day, you probably are not fulfilling the requirements of each link-up. Also,  please link back to this post in your post so people know where to go if they’d like to join in. (Any links not following those two guidelines will be deleted.) (Please don’t make me delete stuff because it feels mean.) 

Also. Please take a moment to visit someone else who has linked up! It’s a really good way to meet new writers and get inspired by the meaning behind their moments. Word? Thank you!