Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Dark secret of shallow waters

I am struggling with the knowledge that I am vain about our daughter's looks. We, of course think she's beautiful. I mean, come on...

Cutie, yes? Anyhow, said cutie was swarmed by mosquitoes yesterday at daycare. View of woodland creatures from their window? Great. The bugs that also lurk there? Hungry.

She apparently has a very high sensitivity to the bites of some bugs. She has welts on her face, and one of her eyes is 1/2 closed. I know it doesn't hurt her, and she's not bothered by her appearance. Yet.. and this is where I hang my head, while out running errands I was feeling kind of sensitive about it. "Stop staring at my daughter, she's fine," kept running though my head. Folks, it's not a little bit. The right side of her face looks completely different than the left.

Here's the obligatory statement about loving a child no matter how they looked. I - we - totally would. And that's where I'll leave that line of thought.

While at the mall, watching her jump on the breakfast themed playscape eggs, Jim leaned over to me and said, "I almost want to show these other parents a photo of her to show she doesn't always look this way." I almost made out with him right there in breakfast land.

We're both laughing and suspicious about our own shallowness in this case. But if our boat has hit some shallow seas, at least we've got each other.

6 comments:

Keri said...

Willa will always look super-cute... no matter how many mosquito bite welts she has on her face.

--Lindsay-- said...

Those ppl were probably thinking "Oh, that poor girl! I'll bet those bites hurt! I wish I could give the little cutie a hug!"

JT said...

Knowing that we have a healthy child allows us to be a little shallow about her looks. I don't talk about God much, but I thank him daily for the health and vitality of our child. Of all of the challenges that we as humans face every day, I stand in awe of those parents of sick or disabled children, theirs is not an easy path, and make my trial look much smaller...

Mandy said...

She's beautiful, no doubt about that - but she also has (from what I can tell) an outstanding personality. She's bright, creative, happy and outgoing. Those things will make her beautiful even with bug bites. :-)

I heart your blog!

Kerri said...

Not shallow at all. She's your daughter; you only want and hope for the best, and sometimes looks are part of the equation! I hope the bites go down soon! You have a darling daughter, inside and out!

I've been getting eaten alive on a daily basis myself! The mosquitos seem awful this year!

Unknown said...

Ha; I know exactly what you mean... hate those big red splotches all over Rainah's face and arms. Willa is adorable no matter what!