We stand at the edge of the Eiffel Tower and its noble heights remind us that we have passed this way before. Before there were girls and hair bows and makeup and purses, there was simply a boy and a girl on a journey.
And he said to her, ‘Let’s wait to climb this great tower until we come again.’
‘Let’s wait,” she said, “So that we never forget to return to the city of lights.”
They kissed, as young lovers do, glanced back for one last look at the gentle giant, and waved goodbye to Paris.
The babies came. Long days, longer nights, tight paychecks and busy schedules that warped into years.
The gentle giant waited, greeting millions with her twinkling lights, smiling romance, embracing love and the joyeux of life.
And then, one day, a version of that young couple returned to her, now with 4 girls of differing heights, and hair colors, and laughter. They climbed and they climbed and they laughed and they hugged right into the heart of that tower, right up to the very top. There, they gazed through her tall eyes at the Parisians below, with their carousels and their toy dogs, and their fountains, and their history captured in breathtaking beauty.
The boy that had grown into a man, smiled at his wife, “I’m glad we came back.”
The wife that had once been a girl, reached up on her tippy toes and kissed his beard, “It was worth the wait.”
And the girls, oh their girls, how they laughed and they teased and they complained that their parents kissed too much and much too often.
But, the tower knew that this is the way of a promise made and kept.
When the sun had tucked himself away and the moon had begun her elegant stroll across the horizon, the tower put on her sparkly dress and she danced a ballet of lights for the family that had returned to her after so many years.
teanna sunberg 