Ringing in the New Year with Darwiniana!

 This weekend, our daughter Julia, the second of the Darwin offspring, got engaged to a delightful young man whom we love as a son. This is a moment of pure joy, untainted by internal reservations or fears. Lots of photos were taken -- not by me; I'm the world's worst documenter of events! -- and as we started to share the news, I wondered: what was the earliest photo of Julia here on the blog?

As it happens, it was the birth of her younger sister Isabel in 2006, and it features all three of the big girls:

Eleanor and Julia welcome an oblivious Isabel

Well, it's not 2006 anymore, and everyone has gotten much older. Let me present the Misses Darwin now:

Eleanor

Eleanor, 22, is now graduated from college. After a year of health woes, including surgery and a colonoscopy, she's finally been diagnosed with PCOS and Crohn's Disease -- which news she's given me permission to share, as she'll tell anyone that she's dying of Victorian Women's Disease. We're still in the throes of learning about how to manage everything, including the double whammy of chronic fatigue being a result of both conditions, but she keeps up her good cheer and her artwork. She played Trinculo the clown in my recent production of The Tempest, and was celebrated for, as an experienced Shakespearean colleague put it, "her extraordinary conception of Trinculo as a being who walks about as if he has no bones in his body."

Julia and William

Julia, 21, finds herself in the amusing situation of being engaged to a man with the same name as one of her brothers. Can there be too many Williams, though? She is at The Ohio State University, and recently changed her major to prepare to study midwifery. She loves hands-on work, and is often busy either with her own projects, or with keeping the rest of us on task. She's become a notable costumer, doing work with the University, and also costume design for my productions. After a recent trip to Italy for Christmas, she's come back more fashionable than ever, but reports that there's no place like home.

William, who came into our lives by playing Orsino to Julia's Olivia in my production of Twelfth Night, recently played Caliban opposite Eleanor's Trinculo. I knew that I could count on those two to be supremely ridiculous while rolling around under a gabardine, and they did not disappoint me. William has the bass voice of a radio host and a gentle good nature that is the ideal foil to Julia's energy. He and my son Jack recently adopted kitten sisters from a litter of strays, and now William's Antigone comes over for playdates with Jack's Mithril. I just live here.

Isabel, no longer oblivious

Isabel, 18, is taking a gap year while she decides if she needs a business degree to rule the world, or if she should just keep making money without going into debt. She is the spreadsheet queen, and will manage your business as well as her own. To the chagrin of her sisters, she scored a used 2025 car -- in 2024. If business does not avail her, she has the chops to be a successful TikTok dancer, and was dance captain for my production of The Music Man last summer. She does not put up with your nonsense, but appreciates a good meme.

The rest of the Darwin youths are minors, though at the rate everyone is getting older, that will change soon enough. The comings and goings in the house rarely cease, and we often have several people (and kittens) dropping by for dinner or to hang out. Like Mary, I find myself increasingly inclined to ponder all these things in my heart, and feel less and less inclination to write about them. And yet they are good things (except chronic disease, maybe), and writing them down helps me to give them all back to God, from whom all blessings flow.

We wish you all the joy of the Christmas season, and the peace that passes understanding.

Darwins, minus Julia (in Rome) plus William