what's cooking?

A few weeks ago something very special happened, our daughter announced that she's expecting her first baby.
This is something that's incredibly wonderful!
Okay many, many women make this announcement everyday, but they are simply not my daughter. So excuse me while I'll beam.
I'm so looking forward to this-except for one little tiny thing: WHEN AND HOW IN THE WORLD DID I BECOME OLD ENOUGH TO BE SOMEONE'S GRANDMA?????
Honestly, I am thrilled. My daughter and son-in-law are the same age as my husband and I were when we had her, so she's neither too young or too old. She's excited, the way any prospective parent should be. We are excited the way prospective grandparents should be. And her brother is already plotting how to take over as 2nd (3rd?) in command. He really can hardly wait. Her grandparents are excited about being first time great-grandparents.
And yet, this announcement made me run to the grocery store and dye my hair. Not just to cover the bit of gray, but I decided to turn my brunette head a nice mahogany shade of red! I would have purchased a sexy new dress, but alas, the electric bill arrived and my husband nearly fell over from the figure (record heat and humidity record here in California you know!). There's only so much you can ask from one man-he too is having to adjust to the news. Plus his wife's hair and the electric bill-a new dress might be that proverbial straw. That's an entire other column on its own.
Suddenly, in less than 60 seconds, I went from "sexy and young-looking middleaged woman" to "grandma"!
This is really why pregnancy is supposed to last 40 weeks. I believe it takes that long for the mother of the parent-to-be to get used to the fact that her baby is having a baby and that she is now entering a new phase in her own existence.
What I am going to really like is what my daughter will be experiencing: new feelings, new life-altering events, a totally all-consuming love that she will find hard to ever imagine. There will also be exhaustion, pain, moments of panic and of course, insecurities. Plus sacrifices she never understood why and how we made, will now be an everyday occurence in her own life.
There's also the fact that I will be witnessing how "the mother's curse" will be played out-all mother's know this curse, it's the one during a particularly frustrating event with your child that you snap and say "I wish you 2 children just like you when you grow up!"
In our home, at the time I delivered the "curse" both children looked at me as if I was a total nut job (and at that moment I was). But I had 2 just like me (smart, stubborn, independent) and so did my sister. I'm sure my sibling and I are just like our mother, so the curse does work!
I am actually pretty sure my daughter and her husband will rise to the occasion of dealing with this remarkably well.
I am sure, I will not only be ready for this event, I will be a world class sexy grandma!