Somebody Always Loves Me

My niece, Violet, who is about 18 months, is not a huge fan of me. If she notices me in her vicinity and that her father or mother or someone more recognizable like her grandparents are not around, she will immediately start to cry. On rare occasions, she has warmed up to me, but it seems forgettable and the next time I see her, we are back where we began. If we are in an elevator, and she is being held but facing me, she will turn her head to avoid me.

When she came up to visit this weekend, she was walking in the hallway towards our living room as I was running to the bedroom through the hallway when our Japanese blue curtain which separates the living room from the hallway, combined with her tiny height, camouflaged her with the dark hallway, and we collided. Or, I should clarify with, she collided with my massive leg, fell backwards at quite a distance away, dropped her bottle and immediately started wailing (wail > cry, she was SCREAMING in agony) for help. Of course, before I could seek help from anyone else more loved by her, I picked her up, and hoping she could not connect the fact that her collision was followed by me picking her up, quickly handed her off to her dad. Yet another fail in the attempt to win over the niece.

That night, we were destined to spend more time together as Andy and I babysat our two nieces. As we were driving in the car, I said to Andy, "Violet hates me," to which Sophie, my older niece who is almost 4, piped in, "It's okay Daisy, Violet doesn't like you but I love you." It warmed my heart to hear her say that to me, and just like that, I knew... somebody always loves me! Her name is Sophie and she absolutely, positively loves me!