Starry Night

Right after I turned the lights out last night, Zahra wanted to wish on a star.

(The last time she did this, the window was open because it was hot out that night and we were trying to let the cool breeze come in to cool off the upstairs bedroom. Only Zahra didn't realize the screen was dirty, so she put her nose to the screen and looked out, gazing upwards, where the stars should be. The soot got all over her nose and lips and we had to promptly run to the bathroom, rinse her mouth out and re-brush her teeth! It was pretty dirty and gross and I felt bad because she was just trying to do a little something cute.)

Granted, you cannot actually see the stars here in the city. What a treat it will be one day when Zahra sees her first inky black sky, complete with billions of tiny white dots, incomparable to a city sky. Like on the Big Island in Hawai'i, where there aren't enough bright lights to drown out the beautiful stars, or on a mountain top out in the California wilderness. But regardless of the star-viewing situation, she wanted to make a wish. She stood up, got up on a pillow, and opened the vertical blinds. She pushed her nose to the glass and began to wish.

"Star bright, star light," she said, getting the order mixed up and not completing the rest of the verse. "I wish for an ice cream truck in my town. It will have green ice cream all day long." And that was it. Green is her current favorite color. After she finished her wish, she closed the blinds, and got back down on the bed. Ten or fifteen restless minutes later, she finally settled down and fell asleep.