Privilege

"To achieve your goals & remain successful, you must be willing to step over the line & fully commit to change." Tosca Reno

When you have daughters, the examples you set are everything.  The bad ones (examples, that is) unfortunately seem to be the ones most oft remembered. I'm skipping over those.   I don't want the reminders, and my daughters haven't forgotten them anyway.  Needless to say, I'm focusing on a few of the things I've done right...

Last weekend I again found myself in St. Louis.  This time the occasion was Daughter #1's induction into an honor society at the university.  She is [almost] perfect [so says her mother] and I am very proud of her. She embodies a maturity and loveliness of spirit that is inspiring.  Daughter #3 and I then spent the afternoon with Daughter #1 and her boyfriend.  Forest Park was the perfect setting for an early dinner, conversation, and dreams of paddle boats while feeding the ducks. 

Daughter #2 stayed behind to hunt with her dad during Youth Turkey Season.  I find it funny that my fashion-designer-wannabe-who-dreams-of-Paris is rather proficient with a shotgun.  Her first bird:  26 pounds with a 10-inch beard.  What a way to start! That's a BIG bird!

And earlier this week, Daughter #3 was registered for Kindergarten.  My baby is not such a baby anymore.  And while I will happily enjoy the hundreds upon hundreds of dollars (multiply that by 7) that won't be paid to preschool each month, I'm left wondering where the last five years have gone.  It is true ~ time certainly passes quickly when you are having fun.

Speaking of which, surely it was just yesterday that Daughter #1 knocked out her front tooth during her first week of Kindergarten.  Yet suddenly the anticipation grows as our family prepares to meet his family...the boyfriend whose family will take her overseas this summer.  Three weeks to be spent between Abu Dhabi and Rome.  Let curiosity be  your magnifying glass, McKenzie, and the world, your experiment. "The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should be given the wish to learn." ~John Lubbock

As for me, I'm preparing for a summer vacation that will extend for years and involve textbooks.  And research.  And writing.  That's the example I want to set for my daughters ~ never to grow stagnant.  To grab the world, however you meet it, by the hands...and run.

The mother's heart is the child's schoolroom.

~Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) 

I love you, sweet girls.  Always.