time for us

Watching my daughter grow by leaps and bounds before my very eyes, I am happy and sad... all at once. There are moments when I know I have not given her the time she needed with me... and daily, time is slipping away. Gone are the days when we would lay in bed and read together... play Barbies and dress-up. No more pretend tea served with plastic cake, on pink plastic china. We have moved on to bigger and better things... but there is no substitute for the time lost. I know that there were long stretches of time, mostly during Eric's deployments, when there just wasn't enough of me to go around... and I was thankful for children who amused themselves... but those are also my regrets. That I didn't plop myself down in the midst of them and just be close to them... listen to them giggle... and play. Lately, these regrets have risen to the surface... time moves too quickly. A couple of afternoons a week Cam has after school programs... and so when I get home from work, it is just us girls. Completely by accident, or perhaps by God's hand, we have started a ritual, these past two days... my daughter and me. We have carved out time, just for us... a steaming cup of tea, and a sliver of something sweet... and something more precious than anything else... conversation.