The child-rearing I was so absorbed in back then has truly led to the present

A two-day, one-night trip to Shonan with my daughter and her husband.

I wanted to etch the record of my grandchild's growth, which only happens now, into my mind one by one rather than just in photos.

What suddenly remained in my heart was the way my daughter looked at her child and the moments she reached out to help.

The first place we visited on our trip was a shrine at the top of a mountain.

My active grandchild is at an age where they need the most supervision from now on.

To avoid blocking the flow of people around them, the father held their hand and let them use their own feet to climb the stone steps one by one.

I watched my grandchild's behavior with a smile.

When they reached their limit for walking, I took over the father's role.

“Okay. It’s about time for a carry, isn't it?”

My daughter followed a little behind, only reaching out when absolutely necessary.

At the seaside park, they were running back and forth at full speed on a gentle slope, letting out little squeals of delight.

The sight made me nervous, wondering if they would fall at any moment.

But I realized that for my daughter and her husband, letting their child play freely as they wished was the top priority.

This is very similar to how I used to keep an eye on and talk to my own children when I was with them in the past.

I remembered an incident from one day when my daughter was about the same age as my grandchild is now.

While watching my daughter play by herself, I was doing housework from across the kitchen counter.

Before I knew it, my daughter had found a box of adhesive bandages and started peeling them off one by one and sticking them all over the living room floor.

At one point, I thought, “I have to make her stop.”

But my daughter, who had just started to become interested in stickers at the time, was absorbed in playing with the bandages as if they were stickers.

In the end, she used up everything in the box, and though I could only smile wryly at the cleanup that followed,
I can still remember the look of satisfaction on my little daughter's face at that moment.

Instead of a parent stepping in to do things for them or telling them what to do,

What does this child like?
What is she most focused on when she does it?
When is she in a good mood?
These were the things I was always thinking about during the time I spent with my child.

I was extremely busy back then. Seeing my daughter now, it overlaps with that time.

I was able to witness such an unexpected scene with my own eyes.

It was a moment where the time I had been looking forward to spending with my grandchild connected perfectly with those nostalgic days when I was raising my daughter.

Those days were so frantic that I can only remember them in fragments.
Until very recently, I often found myself dwelling on that time I couldn't return to, wondering why I hadn't been able to spend more of it together.

But thanks to the trip I spent right beside my daughter and grandchild, I feel like the version of me from back then, who was on the verge of regret, has been saved.

It made me realize that even if it wasn't perfect, something was definitely passed on.