Y turns 5

Y turned 5 years old this week. It was very bittersweet. I was (and still am, slightly) depressed. It feels like the end of something – childhood? Can't be - not yet, surely! Babyhood? Certainly, yes. She gets leggier and sassier by the day and I don’t like it. I miss the soft baby curls. When she lisps or mispronounces words (very rare these days), my heart flips over. Yet...yet...she still has those luscious baby cheeks and her very own babyish smell. She still looks pitifully small when she leaves me to climb onto the school bus. Her eyes still light up when she spots me at pickup time. She starts talking the minute she is off the bus and does not stop for the next 8 hours :)

Maybe I have some more time to savour her babyhood before she becomes a big girl!

She has been unadulterated delight from the day she was born. I’m probably jinxing myself right here by saying this, but the last five years have been a breeze. She was an easy infant, an easy toddler who potty-trained herself at 2 years and an absolute pleasurable kid now. There have been no tantrums, no fuss, no hang-ups. Ok, now, what’s the catch??!!! There’s gotta be one! She’s a confident kid but a little shy and reserved in public. She goes to a toddler singing class and learns freestyle dance. From being that kid who couldn’t string two sentences together in English, she now speaks the language confidently (much to my dismay, Tamil is falling by the wayside).

I remember the sheer happiness glistening through the tears in S’s eyes when he held his daughter for the first time. I felt somewhat the same when her birthday came around this year. Happy-sad is what Y calls it! "Amma are you happy-sad?" She asks me atleast once every day. Of course the answer always has to be "I'm Happy!

She makes my day when she clings to me and yells (and this happens every day) – YOU. ARE. SO. HUGGA. BLE.  AND. SO. KISS. ABLE. I. CAN. NOT. BELIEVE. IT!!!

Happy birthday, little-big girl. As much as I would like to freeze time, I will let you go with the promise of the best years still to come.