Dirty-faced cherub

Toward the end of the gray afternoon, I got this shot of Bella, starting to be tired, her hair all wisps and disarray, her nose runny, her chin wet, and a little of the Willamette Valley decorating her chin, her upper lip, and the creases in her neck. Her two adoring, ever-vigilant parents are reflected in her big brown eyes.

This baby girl with a wrinkled brow and a serious mien grips my imagination. What does she make of this world? If she were in danger, I could lift a car, fight a bear, leap into a river to save her. I am smitten, besotted, gob-smacked.

She's fourteen months old. She hasn't started talking yet, but she does have one sentence, a question actually. No Dada, Mama, Bye-bye stuff for her. Her one sentence, which she asks often, is, "What is dish?"

Little lama, come from the land of Zen with one koan: What is dish?