Cascade.

I put my daughter on a small curved pillow, one that is supposed to wrap around her mother and support the baby while she feeds, and I put her face down with her arms over the pillow so that she looked like she would crawl at any moment. But it was the pillow that was supporting her. It wrapped around her and held her in place.

She's learning motion, starting at her legs, and she kicked and kicked until her chest was atop the pillow and then her stomach. Her balance went a little ass-over-teakettle and she was face down in the blue comforter that covers our bed. She wouldn't give up though. Even face down in the fabric of the blanket, eyes darkened by the weight of cotton, she kicked and kicked in an attempt to get up and over the rise of that pillow. Her face buried and unseeing.

I watched my daughter push blindly into the future. Not caring if that push would lead her over the edge of the bed and splat onto the floor. No, she pushed and pushed without a care to what came next and it illuminated something for me that is a contradiction in my own mind.

I've been in my daughter's place recently, pushing and pushing into the future but the difference was that I was trying to map the destination and it was getting in the way of my journey, the immediate hard work struggle I am trying to present to myself. I have been so focused on the end result, what it can accomplish for me that I'm forgetting to learn the steps to get there.

It's would be like performing on stage, the glamour of lights and stagecraft, but not learning the lines. There would be no performance because the tools that enable one to get there are completely deficient. I'm jumping the gun, that's all I will say. I'm jumping the gun and pushing past the lessons that are staring me in the face today. I need to focus on the immediacy of the moment and push through the now instead of focusing on the hurdles to come. I'll have plenty of time to run tomorrow's race.

So, I pick up my daughter, snuggle with her and coo to show how proud I am of her battle with the pillow, I pick a piece of dog hair out of her mouth, kiss her and wonder which battles she will choose for herself.