Can I take her picture?

It is an interesting phenomenon when strangers fall in love with my baby. I am already in love, so I can understand to a certain degree, but I have invested a certain amount of time and effort into her life. And strangers, well, they just see her and want to "ooh" and "ahh."

While Jess and I were at Arlington, we wanted to watch the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The guard changes every 15 minutes with a symbolic march and formation, similar to London's changing of the guard, but much cooler. Anyway, we were waiting in the hot sun for 15 minutes and Mandy started to get fussy. There is to be ABSOLUTELY no noise at the Tomb, so I was a little frightened one of the guards was going to yell at me for letting my baby squeak. There were tons of people there and Jessi generously volunteered to take Mandy away so that I could stay and watch.

I stayed for the short ceremony and then went to find Jessi and Mandy quietly sitting in the shady lawn. Jessi asked, "Do people often ask to take Mandy's picture?" I couldn't recall a time when anyone had ever asked to take her picture, but Jessi said that in the 10 minutes she was sitting there, two different people asked to take Mandy's picture. I sat down to rest as well and moments later, another random stranger asked to take my baby's picture. How will they explain this picture as they are showing people the highlights from their DC trip? "This is Arlington. Here is a picture of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. And this is a picture of a cute baby at Arlington..."

Of course strangers often come up to me while I am out and about and say how cute my baby is, but never has anyone asked for a picture. It was a moment that I will remember when she is being crazy naughty in public maybe months and years from now. I will know that there was a time when Mandy was so peaceful and darling that strangers wanted to keep her memory in their scrapbooks, online photo albums, and perhaps their blogs.

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