Holy shit, my niece is amazing. All she does is breathe, eat, sleep, and poop all day long and she somehow manages to be one of my favorite people. (I’m investigating the theory that this may be related to the fact that she never talks back to or disagrees with me, but I think it’s more than that.) Every day that I see her, I come home with a new set of pictures on my phone to show The Husband, who side-eyes me and reminds me of a time when I made fun of people who take endless pictures of their babies. So I remind him that no other baby has ever been so worthy of a photo-op, and we agree to disagree. Or something. The point is, this bundle of baby smell and fat rolls has invaded our hearts from the moment she hit the scene and disposed with much of my hard-fought cynicism in the process.
The Niece has a favorite corner of The Sis and Brother-in-Law’s family room, and when pointed in that direction she will stare at an area boasting a dresser, magazines, and a lamp like she is Indiana Jones’ sidekick and they have just stumbled upon the lost ark. (Oh, man! Wouldn’t she be cute in a fedora?!) I keep following her gaze to this collection of dull inanimate objects (the lamp isn’t even on), trying to see what she sees to no avail. But she remains transfixed. So I walk her across the room to the window to gauge her reaction to a change in scenery, and this happens:
Granted, now her view includes sun-dappled grass and golden leaves, but you would think Jesus had just pulled up in a Bentley outside. The child is amazed. And as I look at her saucer-shaped eyes, I realize I have much to mourn in the loss of my own sense of wonder.
Children defy our reason, deplete our energy, and drain our bank accounts, but they do have a sensibility for truth and beauty that the rest of us lose along the path to adulthood. I think about how this loss has been manifested at different points in my life: forgetting to look up and see the panorama of Manhattan’s midtown skyline as I curve around Central Park’s reservoir; crunching an autumn leaf underfoot by accident in my hurry to get from A to B instead of jumping in a pile of them with reckless abandon; dreading the task of cleaning a home that I dreamed about for years, filled with the love I longed for all my life. I believe there’s an evil that targets our virtues and diverts us from being the better versions of ourselves, but I also think that the greatest enemy of transcendence is daily life.
I remember when The Husband and I first started dating and I told a friend I felt like I was walking on air. Then a few weeks went by and the cracks of living in a broken world began to show. Fear, that constantly willing companion, joined in and I found myself realizing that if I wanted to be a hopeless person who was always irritated at the little stuff and without gratitude for the miracle at my doorstep, then all I had to do was keep going through each day on default mode. In other words, remaining in joy for those of us not wearing monkey onesies takes vigilance. And no small amount of gazing, purposely, in wonder at the things we see every day.