I love you Maple.

It is true, you don't know how much you love something until it's gone. My little Maple Genevieve headed home. Lucky isn't the word for it, more like blessed. Maple came to stay with our family back in late May or early June. She is my niece and the daughter of my wife's brother. Her soul is kind and gentle with a free spirit that could only come from her parents. Although, sometimes being a free spirit isn't in the best interest of the little ones.

We all have our problems and work everyday to be a better person than we were the day before. I feel like I am a better parent today than I was two months ago, Maple helped me to see my faults. I wish the same could be said of her parents but this is not the place for that. Maple is only two weeks younger than my Ruby which provided for an interesting dynamic in our house. Arguments, dancing, playing dress up, arguing some more, were basically the norm. My frustration level went to a new high repeating and repeating and repeating the simplest of requests. Use your manners, don't pinch each other, stop crying, don't put that in the light socket, you can't breath underwater, and please be quiet it's time for bed and on and on. I want to think the structure provided and the discipline meted out will take hold and continue as she is back with her Mom, but I don't know.

How do you ask that question? "Can we keep her?"

Her Mom loves her but I can objectively say the environment surrounding her time with us is more conducive to producing a "normal" adult than what she is in now but what is normal. She is happy, safe, fed, clothed, and sheltered. Isn't that all we can really ask? I guess it is.

I just didn't know how much I loved her until she was gone.

I love you Maple.