Her Father's Daughter

 

Baby Granddaughter has returned to my care from her summer vacation, a frolicking, toddling, laughing, growling, jabbering, incredibly happy, funny one year old. Did I mention toddling? 

This day, she made the first of what I expect will be many fine messes.  She spent a good many minutes at the edge of some recently poured concrete removing each piece of straw from the newly sewn grass beyond.  She carefully placed each piece in a pile behind her.  After removing the straw, she discovered the dirt, into which she thrust her pristine, tiny, lily-white fingers to make hole after hole.  After excavating each hole, she experimented with putting her finger back in, along with tiny rocks, pieces of leaf, dirt clods and pieces of straw.  She sat there contently playing, oblivious to the world around her.  This was serious work in which she was engaged.

I watched from the step behind her, to make sure she didn't eat too much dirt or straw.  She only had a small taste of dirt, and didn't seem to like it  much.  When I tried to wipe the remnants from her tongue, she bit me.  Sorry Mom and Dad. A little dirt is good for the soul.

As I watched, I was transported back a couple decades or so. This darling baby girl is her father's daughter.  Baby Orion loved playing in the dirt, stomping in the mud, and he spent years in a sand box on the North Forty, having to be coaxed to come into the house at dark.  His rusted 480E Construction King lives in a place of prominence in the basement.

Beyond their mutual love of dirt, he and she share a joie de vivre that is, at once, exhilarating and tiring.  He was and she is a spirited, inquisitive, social, little chatterbox, always on the go, always pushing the limits. And, as much as my daughter-in-law is loath to hear it, they bear a striking resemblance to each other. 

 

 Baby Orion

 

 

Baby Granddaughter

 

How grand is the luxury called grandparenthood?