Frost.

Nearly every morning, I wake up before everyone else in the house -- still in the habit of keeping banking hours, I suppose -- and I pass quietly through the house, sipping coffee, doing chores, blogging, etc.  But each of these mornings, I always end up standing in the bedroom doorway, watching Ava and Daddy sleep.

Maybe now that events like hospital stays and doctor's appointments have become less frequent, they've faded and flattened into the record of our past, no longer expected to pop up when we wake up and turn another page.  We have appointments, but not so much the kind of worried meetings we would sit through with this or that specialist.  Our goals for maintaining Ava's health and well-being seem more commonplace, and therefore less insistent: keep her lungs clear, make sure she's receiving enough oxygen at night, help her learn how to crawl, thinking of new foods for her to try, etc.

Over the past few months -- perhaps even more so since she's turned one -- our lives together have bloomed, taking their cues from her growing sense of self.  Our everydays are no longer thought of as rigidly charted blocks of time. They stretch to contain unhurried shopping trips after therapy, moments stolen on park swing sets, family lazy snuggle time on the couch, and all the things we imagined doing as a family from the moment she was conceived.  

Sometimes life doesn't turn out the way you want or expect it to.

I've come to realize that in my case, this has been The Best Thing.

If I'd never slept in a sparse, impersonal apartment on my own, I'd might never have appreciated the time I spent with my family, no matter if it was in a nursery or in a hospital room.

If I'd never had the opportunity to be with family during dire hospital stays, maybe I wouldn't have been so calm when surrounded by wires and nurses and alarms day after endless day.

If I'd never had role model parents in my family who actively enjoyed raising their children no matter what their child's needs were, maybe I wouldn't be so immersed in the joy of teaching and caring for our daughter.

If I was rushing around in the morning getting ready for work, fretting about my makeup and shoveling pop tarts and caffeine in my face, I wouldn't be standing here watching my family, my beautiful, wacky, trying, dearer-than-life family, sleeping peacefully as the winter sun creeps into the room like bright white frost.  The moment freezes.  A shutter snaps.  I collect the moment, store it away for the sake of my own secret pleasure. 

I could watch them forever.  

But I'm not.

I'm going to jump in their faces and kiss and tickle them and give them coffee and milk. 

( I would assume you'd guess who's getting what.)