After dinner last night one of my "grand charms" took me outside - I think to be away from the grownups and their talk. It was a girl's night reunion with, counting her, 4 generations of the female part of the family and 3 or my daughter's 
dearest and closest friends visiting. These three have visited middle summer every year for almost a score of years and.....well we are lucky to have them come and be so nice to me/us. But back to one of the grand kids..
dearest and closest friends visiting. These three have visited middle summer every year for almost a score of years and.....well we are lucky to have them come and be so nice to me/us. But back to one of the grand kids.. We went outside and of course the fireflies are in full bloom and I explained to her that when we were kids we used to capture them in a jar and make firefly lanterns out of them. She looked perplexed and I don't blame her because the entire idea of capturing one of these wonders seems to be just a bad idea from the get go. We did decide that when fireflies light up they are just talking to one another in some sort of star trek code - something that is possibly true but I don't know for sure and its not important other than its a nice thing to think about. We humans do pretty much the same thing when we talk to someone we like ... our little lights go off then too.
The stars were just coming out and I opined that they were really fireflies who flew very high so they wouldn't end up in some little girl's jar and they kept their light on so their friends could find them. "No. They are stars". "No, they are fireflies way up high". And on it went.
We had a full moon that rose out of the ocean to the east and she asked if that could be 
a firefly too. The moon hung so perfectly that she could see the "face" and we agreed that it was just someone who loved fireflies and was up there watching them.
Some nights it pays to grow old, granddaughter in tow, tall tales of fireflies, stars and the man in the moon; laughter from the dinner table from old friends and family just enjoying things and the full attention of a child, brain all full of imagination, living in a world that we want to be so perfect for her that fireflies in a jar when they could be stars seems like a bad idea.
a firefly too. The moon hung so perfectly that she could see the "face" and we agreed that it was just someone who loved fireflies and was up there watching them.Some nights it pays to grow old, granddaughter in tow, tall tales of fireflies, stars and the man in the moon; laughter from the dinner table from old friends and family just enjoying things and the full attention of a child, brain all full of imagination, living in a world that we want to be so perfect for her that fireflies in a jar when they could be stars seems like a bad idea.