Breed 'em and Weep

Check out this moving entry on Jennifer Mattern's award-winning blog, Breed 'em and Weep.

SEPTEMBER 4, 2011 · 21 COMMENTS

She arrives home to me today with cropped hair and even more attitude. Her little sister is growing, too, but Soph is crossing over. No more little girl. This is new terrain for us both, this tweendom.

She saunters ahead while I stumble behind, trying to keep her in my sights. I can’t tell you what’s changed. I could, because I know what’s behind the changes, but I would be betraying her confidence. So ask her yourself, if you cross her path, and you see what I’m talking about. The funny thing is, she just might tell you. She’s self-aware, she’s grounded, and she’s willing to talk. She’s navigating her way into her new thinking and new curves and new smarts and new sass and new emotions bloody gracefully. She freaking knocks me out.

I threw out all the books, when it came to Soph, my firstborn. Within hours of meeting her, in fact, I’d given up on the damn books. This kid would go about things in her own way. I saw it in her blue-gray eyes (now hazel, why should anything stay the same?) as I nursed her. I saw it when she refused to coo or smile at strangers. I saw it when she observed other kids, contentedly, from the periphery. She was and has always been perfectly enough for herself. I wish to God that someday I will be able to say the same about myself, that I will learn this from her.

Please visit her blog and read the rest; it's excellent. breed 'em and weep - i'm not going to blow this

Have a lovely day, readers!