my Girl

My girl is singing from the steaming room next door, shower spraying, songs playing.

My girl giggles when I repeatedly can’t pronounce the name of the town in the book she is letting me read to her before bed, the one she asked me a few pages in, “Mom, what’s this about?  I don’t get it.”

My girl has, in the last year, been acupunctured, gluten-free, and craving Goldfish.  She’s won sixth place in the Spelling Bee, first place in the Science Fair, and second place in her creative competition.

My girl is content to spend a weekend at home, glued to the screen, lost in the pages, seated at the piano bench, playing in the snow or sunshine.

My girl texts me minutes after she gets out of school, always asking–though I think she knows–if I have a meeting and what time I’ll be done.  She texts me she loves me, misses me, and if I don’t answer right away, a dozen texts and missed calls follow in the next fraction of a second.

My girl talks politics, economics, astro- and nuclear physics, aerodynamics, Armageddon, boys, driving, and conspiracy theories, all on the road with her dad.

My girl sings in the seat beside me.  She updates me on wildfires, my Facebook feed, and our grocery list on our drives home.

 

My girl, with her purple hair, makes me smile and wish the days lasted a little longer.  In her, I see the little one she was and the woman she is becoming.

My girl, no matter how many of these too-short days pass, will always be simply and, at the same time, never simply that… my girl.