I picked her up at the meeting spot. She was waiting for me on the curb. White cane in her hand. Cute shirt. Tennis shoes. All her luggage.

She bid her mother goodbye. I helped my 12-year-old goddaughter, Becca, into the backseat. And we were on our way to get sunburns.

As I drove toward the lake, Becca had to sit in the backseat because I forgot to bring her car seat. And this particular 12-year-old is too short to legally sit in the front seat without one.

She is four-foot six. Although Becca is insistent to remind me that, with her shoes on, she is four-six and a quarter.

And anyway, it’s not called a “car seat.” The 12-year-old would be piqued if she heard me call it that.

Car seats are for babies. This is not a car seat. It is a “height adjustment apparatus,” which allows Becca to sit in the front seat, directly beside the motorist. Except that, in this case, she would probably not want to sit next to the “motorist” because the driver happens to be a complete “schnoz-whistle” inasmuch as he forgot the “height adjustment apparatus.”

Together we drove along Highway 280 toward Lake Martin. The backseat was filled with mountains of lake toys. Floaty noodles, boogie boards, rafts, life jackets, blow-up stuff, and other cheap consumerist junkola.

Eventually, water-toy manufacturers will include complimentary waste baskets with their products so you can just throw away your purchase as soon as you unwrap it.

Becca sat nestled in a cubby hole made of groceries and luggage. The lake got closer.

“I’m so excited,” she said.

“Excited to swim in the lake?” I said.

“Well, yes. But I’m more excited because we’re together.”

I looked in the rear view mirror. There are times I wish Becca could see my eyes.

Recently, Becca underwent surgery to remove a portion of her ear, due to cancer. I noticed her feeling her ear. Or what used to be her ear.

“What are you going to write about tonight?” she said, fiddling with her ear.

“What do you mean?” I said.

“I mean you’re a writer.”

“Am I?”

“Um, yes.”

“How about that.”

Silence.

“So what is your column going to be about?” she asked.

“Column?”

“The thing you write every day?”

“I write a column?”

Long sigh.

“Well, I have an idea for your next column,” she said.

“Pray tell.”

“Well, whenever we hang out, you usually write about me.”

I looked in the rear mirror again. “Do I?”

Nod.

“Yes,” she went on. “And you always write about how much you love me, and about how much fun we have, and stuff like that.”

“Do I?”

“And in your column, you usually write a bunch of little things that are meant just for me.”

“What kinds of things?”

“Like, you tell me that I’m brave even though I’m—you know—a little scared. And you have all sorts of positive messages for me about how it’s going to be okay, because—you know—you love me.”

“Do I?”

She smiled.

Then, Becca reached her little hand into the front seat and took hold of mine.

“So do you think you’ll write about me?” she said.

“I think you already know the answer to that,” I said.

“Good,” she said, squeezing my hand. “When you do, please be sure to mention how you forgot my stinking car seat.”

“It’s a height adjustment apparatus,” I said.