My Baby Done Gone and Growed Up

Today is an auspicious day.  All of my children are now in the second act of a two-act play called life.  My youngest, my baby, my Laura, has turned 40.  Zounds! I have 3 other children who have, at one time or another, hit the big 4-0h, and one who has just tripped over the half century mark, but none of those anniversaries had the impact of this one. ALL of my children are now 40 and older.  In short, I have no offspring in the 30s.  If we do the math, that makes me...carry the one...old.  As if 9 grandchildren didn't do that already.  (I imagine I will have similar feelings when Tracy reaches 60 (OMG), but with any luck I won't have to blog about it.)

I feel a bit cheated by having had so little time with Laura after her mom and I divorced, certainly not the years I had with her sisters during their youths.  I have scant few pictures of Laura to recall those times, as most of them stayed with her mom.

Not sure when this was, but pre-divorce, I think. 

 

She tried hard...but...

 ...maybe the arts.

 

 

What a cutie....

 

And talented...

Our real bonding came when I introduced Laura to snowboarding in 2003.  She was determined to get it, at all costs.  Her instructors were amazed....that any human being would submit to that level of physical punishment voluntarily. 

Here's my Righteous Babe the evening before Day 1. She was still young then. New England is icy!

Laura and friend, pre-slopes. She was excited.  Did I mention the ice?

Over the years, she acquired a taste for the snow and we took more family trips, though that was the only one she and I did together by ourselves.  One trip we went to Colorado with Brant, also an acolyte of the board--but that is another story--and all looked great... at first.

Early in trip:

End of Trip:

 And so it went for a while...Laura uphill, Laura down....But, at some point, we got the babe a decent board and her health started looking up.  Well, almost...there was that trip to Montana...oh, well, nevermind.

During the many child-bearing years of her siblings, Laura was a fantastic aunt.  You could always count on Aunt LaLa to make the kids laugh or, better yet, to take care of them.  She loved (and still loves) them all.  Her twin nieces lured her out to California in 2008 and we East Coasters have been sad ever since.  Occasional Christmases are not enough!  This is one of my favorites from one of those trips.

But LaLa hankered for some progeny of her own to raise, and in the fullness of time, I had to perform my last official act as Dad.

...which, of course, led to this:

I am amazed by what she does, and how she does it. Managing a family of two men, one big/one small, while running a personally demanding business is beyond hard.  It can't be impossible, because she is doing it.  And doing it well, amazingly even (I hear things).  The fact that she has now officially slid into middle-age makes it even tougher.   Hang in there, Laura, good things are coming. And Happy Birthday, Baby.