...de niña a mujer

This is a photograph of my cousin Eugenia's daughter, the latest addition to the family.  I took many photographs of her and passed them along to the proud mother. And with each blink of the shutter, I recalled parallel images of when my daughter first arrived, especially how she opened her eyes and stared at the world.

As a young boy, I recall reciting these lyrics to myself...al partir de mi lado ya sabía que la hiba perder y es que el alma le estaba cambiando de niña a mujer. Back then it was the melody that gripped me. Today it is the words, words that give shape to the helplessness a father feels when watching a daughter grow up and start to pull away. 

On another recent kayaking adventure, she complained how much her arms ached after an hour cruising the waters. This was her first solo outing. And what began as awkward strokes developed into a smooth glide in minutes. She complained, but she kept on paddling. She paddled ahead and didn't look back. Once in a while she would realize that she was too far ahead and would slow down and call out for us. I tried to avoid thinking about how those brief moments of hesitation would be fewer and fewer in the years to come.  I sat there in my kayak and decided that while I still had the chance, I would paddle and keep up...making sure she was still in sight.