I got to spend part of the day with my friend’s (almost) one year old daughter today. While I was giving her a bottle before her afternoon nap, she looked up at me with her big brown eyes and stared at my face. She just kept staring right at me and I felt like everything in the world was okay.
I was okay.
There is just something about children and the way they look at the world with such sincere curiosity. It’s alarmingly comforting to me.
Of course, as they get older those eyes see more and store more and their gaze is not as innocent as it started out. It happens to us all, somewhere in those first few years on this planet.
I don’t really remember what it is like to look at something or someone and simply behold them, like my friends daughter did with me today.
Instead, behind my eyes is often skepticism, self-doubt, mixed motives, fear.
But oh, to see the world as a child does, to accept a person for who they are and not for what they’ve done or haven’t done, to trust without fear, to cry without shame, to eat without worrying about the next meal.
I desire that kind of abandon.
6 comments:
Amen, Alli.
[I feel terrible for praising your last CD to Kirk last night and then not saying anything when I was talking to you after. It rocks. As do you.]
This is soooo true. I think these same things everytime I rock Boaz. Thanks for putting it into words better than I ever could.
this is the best thing ever when looking down at your baby and seeing big eyes looking at you with the most innocence and hope. the BEST thing, oh how i love it!!!
So true, Alli.
This is one of the best moments in one's life!!! I love these times with my boys and you are so right... they disappear at some point and it makes me want to really remember the "lasts" of all my kids experiences. The last time I rocked Jaxon to sleep, the last time he asked me to sing him a song before nap, the last time he needed me to hold his hand when he walked... I also really love those sincere moments with a child when the whole world seems to stop and I am lost in a life defining minute :) thanks Alli for reminding me to pause more then just plowing forward. I don't want to miss these moments! Jess
I miss those days still. I am looking forward to being able to do it again with my grandchildren:)
That loss of innocence as the child gets older is why I cried when my kids started kindergarten, and then junior high, why I cried as I left my son at college only 5 minutes from home, and why I sobbed when my daughter moved to music city as a teenager:) With each change, it seems like more innocence is lost as a new season of life begins. I get teary just thinking and writing about it!!!
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