Kids and Growing Up

I ran across this post about kids & growing up, You can’t protect them from time, and thought how it captured being a parent.

“That’s right. It’s your job to take care of me.” She said it as if it was an immutable law of the universe, with the same confidence she has in the sun rising tomorrow.

In my mind my three girls will never grow up. My 9 year old daughter still promises to alway be our “baby” and never leave us, my 18 year old daughter is taking charge of her own life, having successfully passed through no-mans-land of the teenage years, and my 24 year old daughter now has a family of her own –

“When I’m eleven, will you still help me sometimes?” I smiled. “Of course. I’ll help you even when you’re my age, sweetie, if you’ll let me.” And then she laughed, the sound of it like the sudden shattering of crystal into a thousand musical notes that somehow play in perfect harmony. “I’ll never be your age, Daddy!” I rolled my eyes and sent her skipping inside.

– Yet they are all still, and forever will be, my little girls. . .