Onward and Upward

People get nostalgic about their kids growing older—about leaving the baby days behind, about the first day of preschool, the first day of kindergarten. And I get that. A picture retrospective of school first days at my cousin's recent high school graduation party definitely choked me up—one minute they are 7 and walking to their first day of second grade, and the next minute they are 17 and thinking about college.

But what I think we hear less about, talk less about is what we are rewarded with as our children grow older. I didn't expect (never thought about it, really), that my seven-year-old would be so much more, in some ways, than her seven-month-old self. That she could become a sounding board about hair, clothes, or shoes. That she could be the person who would remember the things I always forget or that she would be a helper—walking the dog when I'm pressed for time or watching over her little sister the way I know she always does, even if it's to the point of bossiness sometimes. I didn't expect that my five-year-old would pop her head out of the garage door one morning as I was leaving for work to make sure I remembered my coffee. It's such a gradual transition. One minute, they need you constantly and for everything. And then all the sudden, they become these little people with opinions of their own and better memories than you. I would do it all over again—the sleepless nights and the daycare dilemmas and the teething and the terrible 2s—just for that.