Cosmos

Over the past month or two, E's drawings have begun to take on distinctive human qualities. At first they were just big round heads, smaller eye circles contained within their shaky walls. Then the heads grew legs so endless that a supermodel would be envious. Next she added two arms sticking out each side of the head. This weekend we got to hair. Oh, and rocket ships. Yeah, I don't get that one either.

Her ongoing favourite subject is our family. Yesterday she drew her Nth interpretation of we five on a whiteboard and then called me to come and appreciate the results. As I enthusiastically ooh-ed and ah-ed over her efforts, I had a revelation. See the large red figure in the middle of the picture above? That's me. And when she draws our family, I am always front and center. I am the largest figure, every single time.

Now, I don't think she is making a fat joke; a subtle reference to the Great Shrinking Pants Debacle of Winter '09. In my experience, little kids always think their mamas are beautiful. And so we should be.

No, I think her art is more a graphic representation of the fact that I'm currently the center of her universe. I'm her constant companion and her best fwiend. She bursts into my room in the morning so I can accompany her downstairs. She likes to fall asleep with me in bed beside her, holding her wee hand until her breathing assumes a steady cadence. She is a tiny planet orbiting around me in a determined ellipse.

I am her sun.

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On the weekend the two older kids were upstairs giggling conspiratorially together. When I popped my head in the room to find out what was so funny, I was dismissed like some annoying coworker who always hovers on the periphery of office conversations: You don't always need to know what we're talking about, Mom, they told me.

Um, okay?

I mean it is okay, right? It's completely appropriate, if not expected, this steady march towards independence. Though these two children once orbited around me as enthusiastically as their youngest sister, the master plan is that something, many things, will eventually knock them out of orbit.

As teenagers they will likely buzz alongside a cluster of other heavenly bodies, being influenced by the extreme gravity of the opposite sex and the Jonas Brothers, or whatever the flavour-of-the-week is at that time. Despite this anticipated shift, studies tell us that teenagers still quote their parents as one of the most important influences in their lives. It's just sometimes hard to separate that truth from the eye rolling and door slamming.

Ah, but during these years of increasing separation they are preparing for bigger things. They are preparing for the day that they will form their own little solar system. The day when they are the brilliant sun being closely orbited by a planet, or planets, of their own making.

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E. was pretending to be a kitten for most of the day today. At dinner tonight, after consuming the obligatory three bites of her meal, she shimmied down from her chair and meowed her way over to me. She crawled up on my lap, clasped my cheeks between her imperious hands, touched her nose right to my own. She licked my cheek, as cats are wont to do. She coughed in my face. She put her head on my shoulder. She kissed my lips.

I am her sun. And it is a distinct privilege to have her in my orbit.