Amaya's Cast

     While Amaya and I cleaned her room the other day she "found" her cast in her closet. It's been on the top shelf ever since it came off back in February, but she just noticed it for the first time that day. She held it and looked at it for quite awhile. She read the names and messages left by friends and family and I could tell they meant a lot to her.
     I went into the bathroom to put my contacts on and get ready to take them to the playground.  I could see Amaya sit in her chair and get into "teacher mode." She asked Lidie to come sit on the floor with her. Lidie came and sat then Amaya asked her "Lidie what do you want to do first, touch my cast or listen to the story of my short leg? I could see straight in and hear everything they said. I stopped what I was doing so I wouldn't miss a thing. Moments like this touch my heart and make me smile.
     Lidie asked "Can I pretend I have a broken arm and put it on?" Amaya responded, "No Lidie, its very old and fragile." Amaya let Lidie look at it, touch it, and read the names to her. "Look Lidie, that's a mermaid, Shannon did that. And this is where the Grinch, Max and Cindy Lou signed it (it was really Josh, but we won't tell her that).  And look even Mom and Dad signed it." Lidie looked on and said, "Oh, that's pretty." Amaya asked her again if she wanted to hear the story of her short leg. I hoped she would say yes because I wanted to hear her tell that story so badly.  I had never heard her say that she had a story about it, so I was quite curious what it  was. But, Lidie being two and having the attention span of a two year old declined and decided to dance around and sing instead.
     I was quite disappointed to miss out on the story so later I asked Amaya if she would tell me the story and she said "Yeah, when I was a baby I was born with a short leg then I had two surgeries and that was it. I was better." It was so simple, so concise, no drama, no pain, no complaints.