She brings us happiness, there is no question

I wonder what life will be like for Elliott.

I focus on each day with her--drinking up the moments, delighting in her new laughs, giving her slightly dirty looks when she declares "da da" and nothing else, swaddling her tightly for her naps as soon as she rubs her eyes, sitting silently (she hunger strikes if I talk at all) in our usual chair for breastfeeding, calculating that I've now fed her over 1,400 times (no wonder it feels like it's the main thing we do), watching her roll across the room, feeding her spoonfuls of new foods that she scarfs down even while making faces at it, feeling like the best person in the world when she smiles so big when she sees me for the first time after a nap or from the car seat in the back seat.

There's no need to think too far down the road. Don't wish away right now, I know, I know it so well.

But now, when I see other little girls, I realize that Elliott will someday be a little girl, too.

At the mall, the girl scouts hawked their cookies. I felt compelled to buy them--and not because oh, my, goodness, can I possibly pass up thin mints--but because maybe Elliott will be a girl scout some day and, let it be known, everyone better buy cookies from her. And so I wonder, will Elliott want to be a girl scout? And then there's the little girls' section at the department store is full of short skirts and clothes that make me feel old. Will Elliott want to wear this garbage (and will her daddy throw a hissy fit?)?

Time will tell of course. But then I wonder about some questions that just don't have answers:
Will she feel like the oldest child in our family? Will she have the qualities of an oldest child?

And the most important questions, I realize:
Will she know how much we love her? Will she know how much we miss Miles AND how much happiness she brings us--will she know that both of those things can exist at the exact same time?