The Eyes of a Child

Maddie is at an age where she just loves to call out everything she sees as we go down the road.  "RED LIGHT!"  "BIRD!"   "WATER!"  "MOMMY CAR! (Any white SUV)"....You get the point. 

Christie, Maddie and I were driving a couple of weeks ago. As we were driving down the road, we approached a factory, that looked much like the one pictured above.  Now my eyes saw a dirty, gross, factory.  A blemish on the landscape.  To tell you the truth, I barely noticed it.  It seems that we tend to block out the unsavory....ignore the less appealing parts of our world. But suddenly, from the back seat we hear a voice say "CASTLE!!!!"  Christie asked her to repeat herself, because we weren't 100% sure that's what we heard, nor were we expecting to hear that word in that moment.  "CASTLE!!!" again.  Christie being the smarter of the two adults in the truck, quickly was able to deduce that Maddie was talking about that big old ugly factory.  But it wasn't ugly at all in Maddie's eyes.

What Maddie was seeing was a big, beautiful place where most certainly a princess resided.  I mean, there had to be a princess living there right?  ALL of the castles she's known involved a princess of one kind or another. She didn't see the crud coming out of the top as pollution but pretty clouds....A cloud machine if you will.  And we all know that clouds are amazing things in the eyes of a child.  I know I would spend hours staring at clouds as a child, seeing what I could find in them. Clouds were an avenue to unlock my imagination.  It's only later that we equate clouds with darkness and gloom.  It's only later that clouds get in the way.  Funny, it seems like we are taught that our imagination gets in the way of reality along the way too.

Christie looked over at me and  made a face that portrayed a bittersweet feeling.  "One day she is going to see a factory and not a castle."  She was right.  One day it won't look as pretty.  One day it won't hold a princess.  One day her eyes will change and what she sees will be remarkably different.  No getting around it.  But man, do I want her to see those castles as long as she can.  And the coolest thing about the whole thing, was for the first time in MANY years...I think I saw a castle too.