It happened quite late on Christmas Eve. As I recall, the only ones in the living room were my son William and his five-month-old son Adam, who was being walked and burped after polishing off his late bottle. I was in the kitchen, busily putting things to rights for the umpteenth time that day, when William called me into the living room.
"Watch this," he said. He stood in front of the desk, holding Adam on his hip, and moved slowly to the right. Adam looked solemnly at the picture of Joseph Henry French. "Now," Will said, "watch this." He moved to the left. Adam focused on Sarah Pulling Lane French. His eyes widened, and a big grin spread across his face. Then he began to jiggle up and down in Will's arms. He waved his hands. He made noises of utter delight. Will moved back to the picture of Joseph. Adam's face relaxed. He looked at the photo, scrutinizing it politely, but without much interest. William turned and walked slowly by Sarah's picture. Again, Adam all but leapt from his father's arms, his face wreathed in smiles, his eyes dancing. It was the darnedest thing I'd ever seen. We called in several family members to witness the phenomenon. There was no question about it: the baby was smitten by Sarah.
"It's enough to make you believe in reincarnation," someone said. I found myself thinking a private wish that if Adam had to be channeling anybody, it would be the beloved and utterly charming Charlotte, Sarah's granddaughter, because I couldn't see much future for Sarah in this modern world .... not that I believe in such things, you understand, but just in case ...
For the next couple of days, we observed that Adam continued to flirt with the picture every time someone carried him past it. We tried showing him pictures of other family members (just in case Joseph was somehow singularly off-putting). Nothing happened.
Then Adam's father, ever the reasonable one, figured it out. "Come over here," he said, "and bend down to the level of Adam's eyes." We did. And there, reflected in sparkling splendor off the wavy old glass that covered Sarah's picture, was our Christmas tree. It stood directly across the room, and was magnificent in its own right, but the lights were magnified and slightly distorted by the old glass of the picture, and any motion on the part of the observer made them dance and wink, not unlike the lights of a pinball or slot machine.
The skeptics among us gave a sigh of relief to have Adam's behavior so logically explained. The more metaphysically inclined were a bit disappointed. Adam, of course, didn't care, so long as someone was willing to walk him by that dazzling display now and then, and jounce him up and down in front of it.
As for Sarah Pulling Lane, I shudder to think what she'd have made of such a garish display over her face. And on a Sunday, too!
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N.B. This column, written in 2001, taught me the dangers of relying too strongly on Spell Check. After I had written: “The baby was smitten by Sarah,” my machine went into editing mode. A quick look gave me Spell-Check’s correction to my grammar:
“Sarah smote the baby,” it insisted.
Well, the heck she did. Mind your own business, Spell Check!
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©2012, 2001 Julia Sneden for SeniorWomen.com
Illustration from Wikipedia: A 1582 published version of the Latin carol Personent hodie.
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