My daughter, Violet, was nineteen months on Friday, and every day she is more little girl and less baby. She still has rolls, but they are the shapely rolls of a tiny human instead of the squishy mass she had as a infant. She loves carrying purses, wearing bracelets and fancy boots, hitting her brothers with light sabers, and generally ruling the house. I watched her strut across the living room yesterday, in her sparkly tank top and skinny jeans, her half-curly hair framing her face in a ball of blond frizz, lips pursed with purpose as she moved in on yet another toy her brother did not want to share, and I thought, “There could not possibly be another age as delightful as this one.” Immediately, my heart sank…because I’ve done this three times and I know: this age will be over before I blink twice. Just like that her baby babble will form real words: “tank u” will become “thank you”, “dat” will be “that”, “coo-kie” will…still be “cookie” because girlfriend doesn’t mess around with pronunciation when it comes to the good stuff. It is time to switch out her high chair for the booster. Eventually she’ll stop lifting her shirt to show her bellybutton to the whole world, although I suppose that is a good thing. Someday she’ll be more worried than I am about how her hair looks. It will happen so fast.
But before I plunged into a full-blown melancholy, I remembered something else. Because, you know, I’ve done this three times now. I know that I listened to Eli sing “Foppy the Man-Man” on his second Christmas, and thought “This is the best it could possibly be. I have found the nirvana of parenting.” And when sweet, sleepy baby Caleb slept contentedly in my arms for hours on end, I stared at his smooth skin and chubby cheeks and willed myself to remember it forever. “This.” I told myself. “This is as good as it gets.” And there was that magic summer when the boys were three and not quite two. They were old enough to walk and feed themselves and the three of us were thick as thieves while Daddy was at work. There were hours at the splash park and swinging in the backyard; there were also hours of afternoon naps. “These are the best days of my life,” I told myself, as I settled in to take a little snooze myself.
What I should have told myself is “These are the best days of my life…so far.” Eli started kindergarten this year; he tells elaborate stories, dances like a total nerd to his favorite songs, tries to mentor (and sometimes boss) his younger brother, draws and colors everything that he touches, commands a light saber with great skill, and generally relates to me like a tiny person and not a toddler. He can open a book and read actual words; I don’t think I’ll ever stop catching my breath when I hear that. Caleb is funny; he loves to command an audience, and uses elaborate gestures to tell his stories. When he’s really excited, he slips up and says “wittle” instead of “little”. When he gives kisses, he pauses for a moment, as if to soak up the entire moment. His laughter dances off the walls and lights up a room. I have never loved these boys better than I do now; all the time, I catch myself thinking, “What a wonderful, magical age this is.” Because it is.
And that’s just it. Every age is the best age yet. Yes, each stage comes with its unique challenges, whether those are the mounds of diapers or the cataclysmic screaming fits or the stubborn independence as personalities assert themselves. But it isn’t like the early years have cornered the market on magic. Still to come: real, actual conversations about things I actually care about (and some I don’t), chapter books that I actually want to read, glimpsing the fruit of the hard things we are doing right now, and children who actually sleep past 7AM. (I am getting a taste of this with my oldest. It. Is. Amazing.) I’m not saying I want to rush through the beauty of right now, but I’m also not going to waste my time trying to recover moments that are slipping through my fingers. I want to soak up the right now – the good and the bad of it – with the comfort of knowing that the magic will still be here at every age.
Because it will. I mean, I’ve done this three times now. I should know.
