o blesseth thee, ignorance
Jean insists it began when Hermione was two months old.
The light of their life had moved past the earliest stages of development, primitive reflexes having proved she was healthy before disappearing to integrate more complex, voluntary and controlled developmental structures.
Robert disagrees. Their darling daughter has been special from the moment of her birth. He argues, while cortical structures are undeniably involved and pivotal during early growth, they were not mature enough to have mattered in what turned every.single traffic light green as they rushed to the hospital in bustling London, as soon as Jean’s water broke.
Nevermind that whichever car was trying to cut in, abruptly stopped or made a sharp U-turn.
No, something else was at play.
Something, if Robert carefully sat down and thought about it, might have actually found root during the pregnancy, not after.
The road deities smiling at them in bustling, traffic saturated, London was neither an isolated incident, nor was it the last.
The year is 1980. January has brought festivity, snow and another pediatrician appointment for a flock of second dose shots. Everything had been gathered and prepared the night before, diapers, changes of clothes, coats, beanies, water, pacifier, baby food, toys, health journal, their keys, wallets and so on.
Morning comes and it takes forty-two minutes for the new parent to realize that it’s going to be one of those days™.
Hermione wakes on the wrong side of the cradle and with a frown glued to her adorable, pudgy face. Washing, clothing and feeding her are arduous tasks and take much patience, maneuvering and persuasion. They are thwarted four times by a misplaced health journal, last minute diaper change, Robert's missing car keys and Jean’s following suit.
The clock ticks away with no care for their plight before Jean decides with a heartfelt “ oh bloody hell ”, that they’ve wasted enough time. They run to catch a bus and later the tube.
That night, after pacifying their inoculated, pained daughter, the Grangers joked Hermione was getting fed up with all these doctor appointments and had all but taken matters into her tiny hands.
They do find both keys, later on. Neatly hung by the door. As if they’ve been there all along.
Right.
(For all their jesting, incredulous laughter and fond huffing, none of this strikes them as rational. Not a lick of it.)
After the keys, enter the toys.
And, goodness gracious, where do they even start.
Robert is fairly certain not a single item in their little treasure’s panoply was left unscathed.
The six pack of orange, teal and red sensory balls he'd bought? They are as of August 1980 blue, purple and pink. He swore he’d catch some yellow last week as well.
The diminutive Xylophone had been through all the color visible to the human(baby) eye.
The ever-evolving play gym.
A prayer to the rattles.
Another for the blocks and spinning tops.
Many a time had their fingers twitched, feeling for the camera.
How many times had they thought about taking pictures? For there to exist solid, irrefutable proof. That it is no failing memory nor optical illusion of any sort, but an indisputable, verifiable truth.
The possibilities underneath said truth were as endless as they were reality shattering.
There is safety and comfort in willful ignorance. ( The veil goes up. )
The stuffed animals, at the time, were by far the most conspicuous, inexplicable occurrence.
Laura, the babysitter, had marveled at the quality of their daughter’s newest additions, a moving elephant and flying birds, she had said.
`` Oh you’d think they were real, Dr.Granger! Right out of the zoo, if not for their sizes!” she’d gush. Jean had wisely opted out of revealing the stuffed animals were not automated. Nor were they programmed to move, fly, trumpet and chirp.
The last said about the fair sized octopus the better.
They’ve no desire to add more traumatic events to this helter-skelter decade. Orville, Cabbage Patch Dolls, Roland The Rat and Margaret Thatcher have that well in hand.
( The veil suffers significant tears but is not lifted, still. )
O Blesseth thee, Ignorance.
(Honorable mentions : Chu-Chu The Train shouldn’t have been chu-chu-ing; airplanes: yet another case of unauthorized flying; the bouncing pyramid™, blink-and-you-shall-miss-it moving picture books.)
Through it all, their darling Hermione carries on as her adorable, delightful self. They oh and ah as she coos and toddles away. Her babbles are a balm on the soul, her giggles the delight of their home and her first -everything- an elated, rapturous affair.
(Robert all but cried when Hermione called out her ‘dada’ for the first time. Happy, happy tears, they were.)
Behind the veil is also stashed, the curious matter of Hermione’s hair. Not the hair itself mind you - never the hair itself. Her hair is beautiful, voluminous and thick, no you may not touch it and do put away that hair straightener lest we pop you with it. Thank you. - but rather the static? current? electricity which occasionally makes itself known.
When Hermione had spent the night at her doting grandparents, Jean and Robert had found themself speculating the cause after a glass of wine or four. Moving electrons? Charges at rest on the surface of her hair?
Who knows.
They get quickly distracted when Jean plants herself on her husband’s lap.
It has been a while.