DAYS OF WE

We celebrated a good report from the dentist like anyone would – with frozen yogurt. I took the afternoon off from work to spend with her, it’s easily one of my favorite things to do, to soak in every story that bubbles up, to memorize her facial features at this age, to make an effort of pausing time if only for a few hours.

We had the place to ourselves so we took our time discussing the wall of flavors mixing several (cotton candy, cake batter, strawberry, coconut) in her cup before adding the toppings making sure to avoid anything exceptionally chewy or crunchy since she just had her teeth cleaned (doctor's orders). Then we claimed a small round table as ours.

We laughed and I listened as she told me all about her friends and the games they make up. I finished my cup long before she finished hers because she did most of the talking. It seems most of my words are about schedules and to do lists and what comes next, it’s nice to forget all of that in exchange for her conversations.

We let the minutes collect around us without caring. We let them pile up and tossed around the idea of getting a second cup each, but decided against it. We sat there and played a game of “I Spy with My Little Eye” and somehow completely missed the older gentleman that walked in and sat at the table across from us.

We both smiled after making eye contact and he smiled in return then shuffled through some papers and books he had with him. I turned my attention back to my daughter and tried desperately to find something orange around the room.  After correctly guessing the tie-dyed shirt behind the counter, she hopped up to leave.

We threw our cups away and before we could make it to the door, the older gentleman stopped me and said “those were the days, I miss them, my daughter is grown with kids of her own now, enjoy every second with her” and I tried not to acknowledge the tears in his eyes hoping he wouldn’t acknowledge the water filling my own. 

We pulled in the driveway and I unbuckled her from her car seat and hesitated letting her jump out and run to the door. Instead I picked her up and threw her in the air like I did when she was tiny and while she didn’t go as high, she still squealed and giggled just like she used to. The days of we, these really are the days, aren’t they?