Moon Over the Atlantic

L abor day weekend this year was unlike any other of my life. Instead of a family picnic in the back yard, I found myself an eleven hour drive from home on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. My daughter has married her sailor and we made the trip to find them their first apartment.She had done her research well, thanks to the internet, and the first townhouse we looked at was the perfect one.It was so comforting to know that she will have a nice home in this faraway place. We had the rest of the day to see the sights, including a lengthy tour of my new son-in-law's ship which gave us a better understanding  of his life in the Navy.

In the evening we walked the concrete pier to the beach and kicking off our shoes we crossed the sand to the water's edge. The newlyweds waded out a bit further, hand in hand, laughing as a rogue wave surged over them. Directly in front of the young couple, the nearly full moon peeked up over the horizon and then rose over the water. They noticed it at the same time as I did, and I watched them as they watched the moon rise higher and higher in the sky, hand in hand, her head on his shoulder. It seemed an auspicious moment, and it created a beautiful portrait I will never forget. Pink moon rising over my daughter and her husband, moonlight shimmering on the sea.

She came home with me one more time. Home for another two weeks, to pack her belongings and prepare for the move to her new life. She pauses often to give me a hug, to say she loves me. She curled up on my lap on the couch last night, just as she has done so many times. She gazed into my eyes and I could see the tears that crept in. I began to tell her how much I will miss her and she put her hand on my mouth and told me not to say it, and she buried her head in my shoulder.

She was born in this house; through an odd quirk of fate just she and I were present at her birth, a magical moment of close bonding that is impossible to explain and has endured through the years. She is an adventurous soul with a zest for life. She will embrace her new adventure and I am thrilled for her that she has found love and has dreams to pursue. But I will miss her so. And when I miss her too much, I will think of that portrait in time of my little girl, hand in hand with her beloved, watching the moon rise over the ocean. And I will smile.