Perhaps I've grown accustomed to my daily commute from a suburb outside of Kansas City to the downtown loop where I work, and I suppose I should be used to it by now since I've been making the trek for almost 15 years. I detest the rush hour traffic, but I don't really think of it being a 20-mile drive each way ... it just doesn't seem that far from home to work to me anymore, except, of course, on days when it snows like crazy. Most of the people who have been a part of my life or the lives of my children live in the same general part of town where I do. And for all the years that I have worked downtown, I can count on one hand the number of people who have driven downtown to have lunch with me. Forget that there are some really cool restaurants around my office, which is located, I might add, in the Crossroads Arts District. People seem, however, to think that I work halfway across the world. You have no idea how many times I've invited folks to come have lunch with me and their response was, "But you work all the way downtown." OK ... come downtown oh, say, once in 15 years? I make the flipping drive every day of the week, people, in the middle of rush hour ... not mid-afternoon when there's not a lot of traffic. All the way downtown ... sheesh.
Now that I've got that little rant off my chest, today someone came to have lunch with me. And she drove from the same part of town that I live in to come have lunch with me. And she brought her 3-week old baby girl. Yep, you read that right ... she drove "all the way downtown" to have lunch with me in the awesome little coffee shop next door, and she brought her 3-week old baby girl with her. There is so much I could say about her doing that ... driving downtown, caring enough to want to see my face, going to all the effort that an outing with a baby entails, asking me probing questions about my faith, my health, my mind. Yep, I could write more than a paragraph or two about the love and concern that was packed into my lunch outing today. But instead ... instead, I'm going to write about her baby girl ... her precious little baby girl.
She was dressed all in pink ... she is a baby girl, after all. Her hands were tiny, but her little fingers were long. Her little nose was adorable, especially when she would scrunch it up when she stretched. She smelled like a baby should smell ... like powder and lotion and milk and sugar cookies and ... well ... she smelled like a baby. And there's no scent on earth that compares to the scent of a newborn baby, not even one. Her eyes were deep blue, but she was too sleepy to keep them open very long. Her tiny little body wasn't much bigger than a football, and yet every part of her was sheer perfection. She snuggled as I held her and she went to sleep, and I watched her little face in awe of the miracle who rested in my arms. It was hard for me to take my eyes off of her ... looking at her was like looking at the very hand of God.
After the two of them left, I sat at my desk thinking about babies ... about another baby girl who will arrive in January. I'm still a bit overwhelmed at the thought of my son having a baby of his own; I'm not sure why, but it's just hard for me to get my mind around ... my son is having a little girl of his own. As I thought about Matt becoming a dad, I began to think about a song from the movie The Lion King that talks about the circle of life. I just got home a little while ago from helping at Bingo at the retirement home ... it's probably not a coincidence that I spent a significant amount of time today with girls at four different places on the circle of life ... one just beginning her journey, one a young mother of three little girls, one a mom of four whose oldest is in his senior year of high school, one a lovely lady in her twilight years. Four precious girls, I thought as I walked inside my house. Four precious and sweet girls.
"Sugar and spice and everything nice, that's what little girls are made of. Sunshine and rainbows and ribbons for hair bows, that's what little girls are made of. Tea parties, laces and baby doll faces, that's what little girls are made of."
Thank you, Lord, for girls ... ones on their way, brand new ones, ones in the middle, ones near the end ... thank you, Lord, for precious and sweet girls.
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