This is the girl

This is the girl that is my very own heart. This is the girl that smiles and eclipses the sun. This is the girl that has healed me.

I waited so long for her. I'm not talking just about the timeline for the adoption, I am talking about my whole life. It seems sometimes that I was holding my breath for my entire life, that the first true breath that I ever took was the one that I took as my arms encircled her tiny body for the first time.

I never knew how good I could be until I had to learn goodness to be her Mama. I never knew how worried I could get about things in the distant future until I thought/think about the day that she will move out. I never knew how your heart could twist and swell and ache until I watched her sleep. I never knew that being her Mama would mean that I lost myself.

This girl is something special. She is a maddening collaboration of sweetness and stubbornness. She is my blessing in life.

She is my daughter.

This is the girl that says things like "are you gonna make dinner or whiskey dixie?". She is the one that looks at Billy when he meows, decides for herself what he said and then look at him and say " I beg to difference".

This is the girl that conjures bits of paper out of the air and stuffs them into any convenient place. This is the girl that is not above rubbing boogers on her bed railing. This is the girl that is fascinated with cleaning the toilets.

This is the girl that owns my heart.