her bassinet

She outgrew her bassinet.

She outgrew her bassinet like my mom did, like seven of my aunts and uncles did in the forties and fifties, like most of my Gahan cousins did, like my brother did, like I did.

I watch her wiggle and squirm in her now cramped sleeping quarters and remember the tiny newborn that I first laid in the cradle almost three months ago and I wonder where her life will go from here. Will she become a brainy calculus-whiz like Uncle Teddy or a mother of five like Aunt Colleen? Will she be the keeper of family lore like Aunt Sheila, the sweet and selfless sister like Aunt Heidi or the mischievous jokester like Uncle Michael? Maybe she will follow in my cousin Angela's footsteps and become a successful business woman, or maybe my brother's and become a doctor. So many stories have begun in this little wicker basket.

My grandma could not have imagined the history that would come from this bassinet when she purchased it for her first baby girl almost seventy-five years ago. She could not have known that her littlest granddaughter would some day rock her first baby girl to sleep in the same cradle and probably hum the same hymns. Oh how I wish Nanny could see my little Mary wrapped up in her bed.

I wonder how Nanny must have wept when she buried her first-born son instead of placing him back in the bassinet next to her after a penicillin shortage during World War II. I imagine the joy my cousin Erin felt when she finally placed her babies in the family crib after long trips to finally bring them home from foreign counties. I think how many Gahan women must have fallen asleep listening for her baby's breath or who spent hours dangling her arms over the bed, like me, to rock the back back and forth, back and forth.

So, Mary Allison, you graduate into a new shiny crib tonight. I look forward to watching you spin your own story from here. I hope you always feel the same warmth and comfort from your family that you've had from your very first night in our family cradle.