Monday, February 12, 2007


I have to admit that for most of Lauren's four years of existence she has played second fiddle in my attention because of her more reasonable sister Rebecca. Since I have always responded to reason I enjoy seeing how logic has cemented my relationship with Rebecca. Lauren does not respond to reason. Paradoxically she is incredibly neat and is obsessed with order, unlike her sister.

She will not have tomato soup with melted cheese in it the way Rebecca and I love it. So I told Lauren she was going to sit at the table until she finished it. An hour later I gave up and got her down from her chair. But I am begining to understand some of her reasoning. She loves paprika chicken but will not touch chicken a la Barbara which is essentially the same thing. I was pleased when I served Lauren chicken a la Barbara, and called it paprika chicken, that she happily ate her portion.

While mothers can spot traits and personality in their children, perhaps from the very beginning, I am afraid that grandfathers (or at least thison) are a bit slow at this skill. As a photographer I have found it frustrating in not being able to take portraits of Lauren. She did not understand the concept of looking into a lens. When she she learned it about a year ago she suddenly developed the habit of blinking her eyes rapidly when facing my camera.

That is all behind and now Lauren wants to be photographed. She gets up on my lap, when I sit in front of my computer monitor, and asks me to see pictures of herself.

On Saturday with Rebecca away to one of those Saturday birthday parties (at the present time Rebecca's Saturdays will be fully booked until next year) Lauren asked me if we could walk with Plata (my female cat) around the block. She wanted to know if she needed to put on her shoes. In the summer we all walk barefoot on the hot pavement and on the soft sidwalk lawns. I told her it was still too cold for that. We went around the block and Plata behaved very well, following us all the way around without being too distracted by birds.

I now feel a great "gravitational" pull between these two heavenly bodies and I must find safe shelter somewhere in between. The prospect is exciting.