Never in my life has time moved so slow, it has also never gone by this fast. It seems like yesterday we were on our way in to the hospital, and an eternity every time she cries. It is impossible to explain what it feels like inside when i hear the flutter of her tiny lungs when she coughs or hiccups..To see pure wonder and amazement on a daily basis, an innocence so in tune with the moment, one breath, one thought, one focus. It is so amazing to watch her eyes gaze at shapes, forms, contrast, and abstractions alike. The leaves rustling on the ground, the sun in the trees, no subject or reason is important, nothing to be debated or dramatized. Just the purity of existence, at its core looking back at me. Knowing every move I make is recorded, documented, and copied by her sponge of a brain, it makes me examine every reason Ive  had for anything, ever.  The constant feeling of pleasant anxiety knowing that just around the corner is another building block for the next adaptation, and one after that, and so on. As she sleeps, I type, I wonder. She still sleeps, no concerns for what tomorrow brings, no anticipation, she just sleeps, rests, her body warms as activity at the cellular level do nothing but interact, growing, expanding…She will never be the same, she will never be as small. Arguing over what photos to choose, Jennifer said something that the photographer in me sometimes forgets when dwelling over technicalities, she said “if I could only have pictures to remember this time, these real moments, these interactions,  these would be the ones I would want to have forever”. I lose, she wins again. Here is to Ayla, and to 2016.