“Ooo!” she exclaimed as she ran past me on our way to the car this morning, “Fresh snow! I’m going to make my own tracks. Because I LOVE walking in snow that no one has touched!” After she finished making her tracks, she smiled at me, with a “Tada!” and a curtsy.
This whole interaction was pretty interesting to me. First, it happened, quickly, in those few moments before we got in the car to drive to school. Second, I personally wouldn’t have described the scruffy patch of snow by our garage as “fresh.” It was actually a few days old. And finally, I give her credit for finding the narrow strip of untouched snow, just past the very much trampled on area.
Somehow, this whole interaction got me thinking.
This morning, our sweet Ellee decided to rock the huge puffy red skirt that I had originally gotten as a photography prop. “Really?” I questioned as she walked out of her room this morning. “Mom, I LOVE this skirt,” was her reply. And I shrugged my shoulders and we got on with it (though sometimes I personally wonder what her teacher thinks as she skips into her classroom with her own personal outfit creations). Anyhow, paired with a pair of black cowboy boots and her penguin shirt, she was ready to go. And she didn’t seem to care so much what myself or others might think.
Because she was a fan of walking in the fresh snow… where no one had previously walked. And I love that about our daughter. And I want that for her. I want her to make her own paths in life. I don’t want her to walk just where others have, I want her to have strength and confidence to make her own way.
It reminded me of the Robert Frost poem, I had to memorize in 8th grade. You know, the one about the two roads.
The ending which goes:
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
And after everything, I thought, “Hey 2015… here’s to making fresh tracks this year.” Here’s to walking in the fresh snow, where no one else has walked. It’s something that I want to see our daughter do, and something that I know I want to do myself. We’re twelve days in, to a brand new year. I love new beginnings and this was the perfect way to get my morning into perspective. I don’t know what my fresh tracks will look like this year, but I do want them to be different and I do want them to be amazing.
Laura Herr Photography 