Today, on what would have been your 1st birthday, I celebrate you my darling blue eyed niece.  We had 11 months, 3 days and a handful of hours to call you ours.

We are taught that love is infinite and I think that we as humans believe that means that the love that we show and give others will always be infinite as well.  And in a sense, it is.  I will always carry you in my heart and each family photo from now on will be missing you.  But had I known that loving on you, holding you, breathing in that sweet baby scent of yours was not the infinite number we’d been promised but a specific and very countable number of times, my heart would have broken.  That is the very reason for the guise though, because I would have held onto you desperately, never letting you go had I known and love should never be desperate.  It should never be held down & tethered as if it would be whisked away at a moment’s whim.

I few years ago, I had a dream that your Dad, my baby brother Josh, had died in some tragic accident and the feeling of grief I awoke with was so tangible that it nearly choked me.  In the years since, he certainly has come close to actualizing that dream of mine and I don’t think I would be alone in saying that more than a few fevered prayers have been said on his behalf.  But then you came, and like most daughters, you had him wrapped around your tinest finger the moment you first drew breath.  You mellowed him, stilled his recklessness and gave him a purpose outside of himself with which to hold onto.  Comfortable in his role as a father; if he faltered we never saw it, and the hopes and dreams he held for you were plain as sunlight upon his face.  In short, you, dear Trinity, made him a better man.

Though we will never know why you left us so soon perhaps those angel wings of yours were ready to be claimed; earned from the moment you were born.   And though we will grieve the loss of you everyday; to have loved you and to have known you was worth the tears of a lifetime. So please fly high sweet one and know that though we will miss you till the end of our days, we are ever so grateful that, for a brief moment in time, you were all ours.