I was sitting on a bench the other day, enjoying the beginnings of spring and the ending of midterms, when a cute baby (of which there are always plenty walking through the Yard) came toddling towards me. She stumbled forward, her body weight see-sawing between both feet, shifting back and forth. I watched, a slow, amused smile curving my lips upward, as she waddled across the greenery, closer and closer to my bench.

A squirrel ran between us. Distracting her from the careful craft of walking; right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot. Her focus broke, suddenly, and down she fell. I cringed, and my body tensed in anticipation of the cry which her mouth was quickly shaping to make. But I was wrong, and out burst a laugh from that rounded, tiny mouth of hers. High and sharp, her giggle cut through the still air in the Yard, cut right through the silence of that late Tuesday afternoon, slowed the breeze as it blew by, and stopped the flying insects in their tracks. Sitting in the grass, her laugh only grows; head leaned back, pink gums exposed, showing off the tiny white nubs of teeth just starting to poke through.

She is beautiful, and it hurts so much to think one day she might find herself on a bench in the cold outdoors, inhaling what needs not be inhaled, dehydrating when she means to be drinking.

She is beautiful and it hurts too much to think there might come a point years from now where she looks at mirrors with disgust and at sustenance with resentment.

This smooth skinned little spirt, with brown eyes so big it's a wonder she cannot see into the human soul, is so perfect, so purely happy in that moment of laughter that it is hard to imagine she will grow into anything different. It is difficult to picture her transform with age, and fast-forward to seven, thirteen, sixteen, twenty-four. Will it start with her hating her braces? Will it be the comment another girl makes at a sleepover about her round cheeks? Perhaps it's a dieting book her sister might bring home from the library, maybe it's the calorie counting app she is taught to navigate later that same week. Or she will grow several inches past average height, or she will be raised playing with blond dolls only, and never be told that thick, black, curls are just as breathtaking.

I imagine myself at that age, was I as brave and playful as she is? Did I run around after squirrels, and trip over my own two feet? I'm sure I did, the question is, when did I stop picking myself back up? When did I stop laughing at myself when I fell over, and start crying? When did I forget that curly hair is gorgeous and round stomachs are okay, that the outdoors is a place to run around and chase animals and enjoy the fresh air? Lost in my own revelations I didn't notice that the toddler had gotten back up and was now wobbling over to her parents some distance away, but I watched her back for a long time, and stared too, as the family turned a corner and disappeared from view.

All of the girls I know, the beautiful girls, the funny girls, the smart girls, the sad girls, the athletic girls, the poetic girls, we were all the same innocent toddlers once. Untouched by judgment, unaware of the insecurities to come, naive about the world around us, we stumbled through those early years of existence caring only for those who showed us love, and for that which brought us joy. Watching the purity of the happiness displayed in the Yard that day opened my eyes to all that has changed within me over the course of 18 years.

As for that baby, I can wish her an easy adolescence, but I know deep inside that she will most likely face judgement, sexualization, insecurities, and sexism like the rest of us. But to see her laugh, to see that innocence and know it is only a matter of time before she loses it grabs at my attention and breaks my heart in a way that my own suffering has not.

She is beautiful, and it hurts so much to think one day she might doubt that was ever really true.