Happy Birthday Epiphany Baby!

Every new year's eve, I'm struck by how silly our measurements of time are.  Someone decided the year would turn at the end of December, but (as I often reflected while picking through slush in my heels trying to catch a cab on NYE) they really could have just as easily picked the end of June.  Aging, too, seems arbitrary to me.  I fully expected to feel the weight of that extra digit when I turned 10, but it felt exactly like nine had just the day before.  And we all know 3 year olds who act like 18 year olds 30 year olds who act like teenagers.  At any rate, I never assigned much value to turning a year older, unless it got me a license or a drink.

Rosie, however, seems to be taking her upcoming first birthday very seriously.  She'd been coasting happily for the past six months, still waking up twice a night and not terribly interested in solid foods or moving.  I was so enchanted by her smiles and habit of clapping after I feed her that I sort of forgot that she was supposed to be crawling and pulling up on furniture and wrecking Buzzy's projects.  But, a couple weeks ago, she finally started to accept the responsibilities incumbent upon a big one year old girl: chowing down on real food, crowing loudly, and scooting across the floor on her bottom.  We've been forcing our little drunk sailor to stand to build up her leg strength, and today she lolled against a bench and said "hi!" clear as day to one of my friends.  She loves to wave (albeit, backwards) and clap.  She loves to call for, "Da, da, da!"  ("Mama" is reserved for emergency calls to get out of the crib, but I'm frequently so close by that she does take me for granted, the little stinker.)  She's started putting random things in her mouth and has quite a temper when I fish them out.  Toddlerhood is five minutes away.

Much as I'm curious to see who this little being is, I've enjoyed her sweet babyhood so much that I hate to see it end, but that silly calendar tells me that it's time.  Happy first birthday, Rosie, and many, many, many returns of the day.