A Different View

(photo: The County Star)

This. This is what I had been waiting for all week.

Remember how Millie went to visit Santa Claus at the library, and the reporter for the small, county paper had asked for her name and age? I was anticipating it for days, proud that my baby had already been published. An early child star. It was going to be nothing less than brilliant.

But this (above) was the picture. And it's not a bad one- Santa's face is in full view, and the children's books look nice behind him. Only a split second later, though, Millie reached up and gingerly touched his beard. I was standing a few feet to the right of the reporter, and got the shot you saw in my earlier post:

A nano-second and inches of difference, but this picture captured it so much more for me. And maybe no one else would notice. Both are pictures of a chubby-cheeked girl in a pink dress, sitting on Santa Claus' lap. She's wearing the same headband, and he has the same coat.

But motherhood means noticing. The small gestures she makes. The words I know she's saying though they aren't intelligible to the outside world yet. The cry in the middle of the night meant for my ears. The expressions on her face and what they each mean. After all, we all saw the same thing that night in the library. 

I just had the best view.