Julie

Oh joy, oh rapture, oh bliss! I got an email today from my niece Julie -- guess who just picked up her PhD from Harvard, thank you very much! I'm so pleased for her. She also mentioned that she and her husband are having a second child, in January I believe, but frankly, that doesn't thrill me nearly as much. *Anybody* can have a baby, but how many Harvard PhD's are out there? Well, probably a fair number, now that I think about it. But there are a lot fewer Harvard PhDs than there are parents, that's for darn sure!

I always liked Julie -- she's not my oldest niece, but she's the oldest one I know well. I remember her as a baby -- so skinny her Pampers slid right off her hips as she toddled around the house. It's surprising she ever learned to walk at all, she got tripped up so often. A less determined infant would have given up, I'm sure.

She got interested in Chinese languages as an undergraduate at Northwestern, and ended up spending a number of years living and teaching in China. Her first husband was Chinese, now that I think of it. He was a lovely man -- an actor, very handsome. But her current husband Fred is even more handsome, so I think she traded up. And their daughter Hannah is a little long-legged goddess -- almost as skinny as her mother was at that age, but even more beautiful. And incredibly intelligent -- well, she's in my family, she'd have to be, right? Oh, dear, this new baby's going to have a lot to live up to.

Babies. Better them than me.