Dawn Dish Washing Soap

Tonight Wee Wild One, W2O, or my littlest one formerly known as Baby Girl, licked the top of a can of bug spray.  Shortly after that she drizzled Dawn dish washing soap all over a plate and dipped somebody else's pancakes in it and put them in her mouth.  She laughed while her oldest brother threw her from the couch onto a bean bag chair.  She giggled more when he tackled her off of the bean bag and onto the floor.  Me, I just threw my hands up into the air and smiled...because we were at somebody else's house...and politeness dictated that I don't throw myself on the ground and scream and cry and say, "Why?  Why?  Why?"

I remember being about nine or ten and traveling back home with my family to Colorado from Utah.  I remember wondering aloud what I would look like when I grew up while I watched mile after mile of crusty Wyoming dirt repeat itself outside my window.  I was hoping to look like one or two of the sooooooo-grown-up girls on BYU campus that I'd seen while we were visiting.  Maybe I'd be blond or tall or eye-poppingly stylish.

Somebody said, probably my brother, although possibly my very reasonable older sister, "You'll just look like yourself, except older."

I was disappointed - didn't want to believe it.  I wanted to hold out for my straight, brown hair to go blond, maybe with a natural curl.

I find myself all the time trying to imagine the CK, the Sidekick, Little Linebacker and W2O as grown up folks.  I wonder what they will look like, what their attitudes will be, how they will see the world. 

Then I remember what my sibling said in the car, "You'll just look like yourself, except older."  And I think, "Hmm.  That's right.  Well, hot dog!"

So I guess my job is to show my kids just how much I love them for being who they are...even if it means they like to eat somebody else's leftover breakfast with a dash of gooey, blue Dawn.