In a few weeks, I will be coming out of the box.
This is where my German grandchildren think I live.
Every few days, they chat to me in a curious mix of German, English and general baby babble, waving and saying words that sound a bit like "Grandma", seemingly delighted to see me.
They then trundle off to their toys and the general mayhem of life as a pair of almost-two year old twins.
They park the little box that "Gama" lives in and scurry backwards and forwards, showing how they like to chomp on whole cucumbers and carry favourite stuffed toys.
They show me their books and their toys, their ability to share and their ability not to share, depending on the mood of the moment.
For that time, it is like I am in their living space with them.
I like to give them little instructions, less for the instruction and more to see if they understand English, given that most people around them except for their mother, speak German.
But in a few weeks time, I will be able to see if they can understand me first hand.
In a few weeks, I will be in that lounge room, no longer confined to the phone and put down on the table. In a few weeks, I will be able to sit on the floor and play shops, play dress up and hide and seek and dress their dolls with them.
But there's more - because the prompt for this visit is the arrival of their new baby sister.
I will therefore get to meet three grandchildren for the first time in one hit. But unlike with the twins, I will get to cuddle this new little bundle of pinkness. I will be able to get her little hands to grip my little finger. I will be able to bath her and dress her and smell that baby smell that comes from being a newborn.
I will be there in a world of pink, three girls born to my only daughter who as a little girl hated all things girlie and pink. But now she rightfully adores everything about her feminine little word as any mother would.
The world turns. The years pass.
I can't wait to travel half the world and feel like I have come home. - Linda Muller
