There's something about little girls named Emily, how they always seem to have red hair and a penchant for applause.
Dinner with friends of the family on Saturday night, clouds of gray hair and piles of giggling cherubs.
I wandered in after a random battle with traffic and helped as much as I could in the kitchen.
Dori relocated "cutting the Kugel" duties to me since her inept accountant friend seemed to be performing crumbling rituals with the knife.
When that was done it was time to crawl underneath the mass of writhing children and institute ticklefight rules and regulations.
The littlest there was a crowing redhead named Emily, daughter of Michele, a girl that used to be the hip cool teenager in my twelve year old wistful eyes.
Michele has gotten a little thinner, is cutting her hair a little less wile, and looks and awful lot like cf's sister.
Emily is just old enough to be sitting up, and already whenever something hurlable rolls within her reach she scoops it up with her fat little fingers and throws it with all her might, clamouring for applause.
Rachel's little black pigtails tickled my nose incessently, as she clambered over my shoulder from behind to tickle my belly.
Alexandra practiced the proper way to pet a dog on the large stuffed Fido plushie that her aunt had commandeered when she'd bought her cellphone.
Rachel's mother, a friend of Michele's cam e running past, terrified that her daughter had gotten lost.
I dug her out of the mass of giggles in my lap and brushed some cake from her hair.
Rachel's mother sat there, somewhat stunned -- her daughter is usually terrified of strangers.
Ahhhh, but strangers aren't monstres, and strangers don't have hearts filled with clowns.
All the moms went back to their coffees, all the grandmum's went back to their pinching of my cheeks.
Too many great-grandparents, with their tight skin and clawed fingers jabbering about that strange little blonde girl on the carpet.
Too many of them realizing that yes, I understand when you speak to me in polish.
Suddenly, I was someone they could speak to, tell about their accident last year, about the tragedies in their lives, rant about my curls and my cheekbones and my shining eyes.
My generation went on around me, picking at their sugary-fillings.
I say with the future in my lap and the past stroking me tenderly.
I left, head swimming with familiar polish accents, belly filled with giggles.