happy kid

As I was leaving home this morning for a meeting, I ran into my neighbor as we were both out in front of our homes in front of our garages. He was there with his dog and his little girl. She'll be two in October. She said hello to me, and I said hi back. And then she came over to me looking intently at my shoes. She stood in front of me looking at my shoes: a pair of cheap sneakers in a retro style. Her dad said, "she's really into shoes right now." Then he said to his daughter, "cool shoes, huh?" She didn't say anything but then she looked up at me and simultaneously through up her hands in the universal two year old symbol for "pick me up." I did, and she hugged me. I told her she had cute shoes, too: little sandlas with applicaied plastic flowers. And then I put her down.

But that image of her looking up at me with her hands up stayed with me all day. An incredibly genuine and innocent expression of love and connection combined with complete expectation that such love and connection is our spiritual birthright, even from a neighbor you don't know very well. And it is so.