I was at Holiday World with my kids and the DH.  We wanted one last hurrah sort of thing before school started.  While the older two rottens were riding one of those bird rides, you know the big birds attached to cables and it spins them through the air, I looked across the path and saw this cutie with thick, seriously curling black hair.

Hey, relax….it was a baby.  I kept looking at the little guy with his head full of hair and then down at my angel, who is just now getting wispies on her pretty little head-and she’s almost 14 months old.  She was snoozing in her stroller and I told my husband I had to go check out this little guy because I was seriously falling in love.

So I go over there, talk to the lady holding him-it was his grandmother.  I touched his hair and said something like, Man…my little girl is going to be three before she has that much hair.  She smiled, but it was a sad kind of smile.

Then the little guy shifts in her arms and I saw his face.   I recognized the cleft lip and didn’t even blink.  He had these amazing dark eyes and curly lashes and surgery will fix that cleft lip just fine.  He was still so beautiful to me.  He was watching me and I knew I was just falling in love.

Then my heart was broken as his grandma said, “We have less than two years with him.”

I was shocked.  Couldn’t understand it.  Yes, a cleft lip could cause nutrition issues but nothing that can’t be fixed.  I couldn’t keep from asking why.  I mean, he looked so beautiful and perfect.

Then she tells me that he was born with a brain abnormality.  The human brain has four chambers.  He had one.  His higher brain functions, according to the doctors, would never develop.  He can’t eat on his own and he never will.  He was the size of my daughter at two months-and he was six months old. But he watched me while I talked to him and I swear I saw something in those beautiful brown eyes that went deeper than just basic brain function.  Basic brain function-it’s what makes us breathe, makes us blink, keeps the heart beating.  I know I saw something more in those eyes.

His grandmother seemed almost eager to talk to somebody and we talked for nearly 30 minutes before we finally said goodbye.  That family has been in my heart and prayers ever since, and when I got back to my little girl, all I wanted to do was snatch her up and hold her tight.  How petty must I have seemed to go up to that lady with that precious baby who’ll probably be gone before my daughter is even going to the bathroom on her own, and mumble about his beautiful head of hair?

How trivial was that of me?

But I’m glad I went over there. I’m glad I got to see that sweet little baby and I hope his grandmother understands how absolutely beautiful and precious I found him.