Glory to God for all things!

Our daughter usually telephones us on Sunday nights. She's missed the last few weeks while her son goes through a "sleep adjustment," basically growing out of his afternoon nap, at the ripe old age of two. When I was a kid, it was a rare child who didn't need an afternoon nap even in kindergarten.

However, she had momentous news: Her home pregnancy test confirmed that she is expecting her second in June. For me, the strangest part of grandmotherhood is seeing my daughter -- the fruit of my own womb -- being fruitful in her turn. When she had her first, I cried all the way through her shower -- I just couldn't overcome that sense of a long, long, long history, stretching all the way back to Eve, with who knows how many of Eve's daughters in between, most of them by now nameless. The farthest back I can trace any kind of ancestry is my great-grandmother Catherine Dunphy, born in 1865. There were a lotta Dunphys before her, whose names I'll never know this side of eternity. And in 500 years -- who will even remember Christa, let alone me? It's not that I mind, it's just that it's so mind-boggling.

And now it begins again. This time they're hoping for a girl, and they like the name Sophia. No idea what they'll do if it's another boy, but at least I can count on his not being named Barsanuphius. ;-) In any event, I have begun saying a round on my prayer rope for "Baby Sophia," as well as for the whole rest of the family, while I try to get my head around this whole circle-of-life thing.