All Grown Up

Over the summer, when I'd be lounging in the living room with the kids, often lying on the floor complaining about the heat, I would take a few minutes to write a blog post and then I'd often pass my laptop over to my Wonderful Smart Beautiful Daughter. "Want to read this?"

She'd read the post quickly. Sometimes she'd say, "Oh, it looks good." Other times she might say, "Oh, that ending doesn't seem right" or "Maybe you should cut that sentence out before you post it." She has an amazing ability to look at a piece of writing, and figure out immediately what it needs to make it stronger. And when we looked at photos together, she had that same quick, decisive reaction. Every night on our west coast vacation, she and I would look through the photos I had taken that day. Even if I had taken dozens of photos, she could immediately point to the photo that I should put on my blog – and explain to me why.

One night I said to her, "You know, you're really good at this. You could be an editor."

She looked at me kind of strangely: "Uh, that's what I'm planning."

Oh, right. Snowstorm University has a Journalism School, and she is majoring in magazine journalism. I've even read the stories she wrote last semester, and I know that she is assistant editor for a magazine on campus. But for some reason, I had never made the connection between the advice my daughter would give me, as we were both snuggled on the couch looking at photos or text on my laptop, and the courses she was taking at college – or the career she was planning.

When my kids were little, people would often ask them what they wanted to be when they grew up. As I listened to the kids' answers, their futures always seemed comfortably far away. And yet, now, I have a grown-up daughter who clearly has the skills she needs for the career she is choosing. She is smart, confident, and educated.

How strange to think that for one of my children "when I grow up" is almost here.