five and a half

I was sorting through some stacks of paper and I came across the Christmas list that you wrote to Santa. Well – you started to write it, and then apparently grew weary of the task, and dictated the rest to your dad. I’ve decided to keep it, to tuck it into the box of things we deem worth tucking. Away for now, waiting for a moment in some distant future when we’ll find it again and smile. For Christmas you wanted a Pink Pony, a Rainbow Unicorn (that also glowed), and while you were in the act of requesting glowing animals, you threw in a Glowing Turtle as well. Once you moved on from animals that do not exist, you turned to items that you could imagine enjoying on a daily basis – Bells that would peal each morning through the air to bring you gently, joyfully, into the new day. And Magical Windows that open and close when you tell them to. Even after this list was made, you continued to talk about these things as if they could exist. You later modified the windows’ actions to work when you merely thought about them opening and closing.

We were looking for real clues, a little guidance, on what to wrap up for you for Christmas. Your list was no help at all on that front, except that we all read it and realized that glowing animals sounded so cool, and morning bells would be beautiful, and oh, if we could just lie in bed and gaze out at the summer blue sky from your third floor hideaway and just imagine feeling the breeze on our face and the windows would throw themselves open at the mere whisper of our wish!

We didn’t know that we wanted all of those things until you said them.

We didn’t know that we wanted to engage in heated debates over the sequencing of every task, until you were here to spark them. We didn’t know that we wanted to be brought to our knees by your fiery temper or your razor sharp wit, until you were here to launch your words in equal parts vicious and hilarious. We didn’t know that we wanted to read poetry and offer shoulders and listen to the same songs over and over and over again, until you were here to express utter delight in things that we can delight in doing for you.

We didn’t know how very much we wanted to think up someone like you, until you were here and you were more than we could have ever imagined.

Welcome to five and a half. You’ve earned it, my sweet, sweet girl.