Thoughts from a Heavy Heart

I can remember vividly the time I was pulled over by a police officer with my daughter in the car. She was maybe 4 or so, all golden curls and sweet disposition, sitting in her carseat in the back of our Honda Civic. We had just finished painting pottery with some of her friends and were heading home along one of the main thoroughfares through downtown when I noticed the police car signaling behind me.

I found the nearest spot that I could to pull over. I immediately felt anxious, because I had no idea why I had been pulled over. My mind started to race a bit, because I wasn’t speeding. I hadn’t changed lanes inappropriately. I didn’t go through a red light. I couldn’t figure out why I was being pulled over. But I glanced at that face in the back and knew that I needed to provide the appropriate perspective for the little one who was watching me so closely.

I smiled, and said that a police officer wanted to talk to us, so I was pulling over. She asked why. I told her that I didn’t yet know what he wanted, but that police officers are here to help us, so we will find out. About that time he showed up at my window. He smiled and greeted us both in a friendly way, taking note of my daughter in the back. I honestly can’t remember if he asked for my license and registration, but I do remember that he was quick to let me know that he had pulled me over because one of my brake lights was out. He asked if I was aware of that, and I said I wasn’t. He suggested I get that fixed right away, and I agreed I would. He smiled some more, presented my daughter with a sticker, and then left us to continue on our way.

As we pulled back out into traffic, my heart still racing a bit, I made sure to smile brightly in the rearview mirror as I told my daughter how nice it was that the police officer let us know our brake light needs fixing. I wouldn’t have known it was broken otherwise. She was very quiet for several moments. In a small voice, she asked if I was going to tell Daddy. About the brake light, I said? Of course, he’ll want to help us fix it. Another pause. No, she said. About the police officer. Of course, I said. The police officer was just there to help us. Of course I will tell Daddy about that.

For a long time, that has been one of the funny stories in my back pocket. The punchline, of course, being the last part where she wonders if I’ll tell her daddy about the police officer.

I keep thinking of that story today, and it doesn’t feel so funny. My heart has been heavy this week with the horrific death of George Floyd and the country blowing up in response. This week I sat on the couch with that same sweet girl, now a teenager who is trying to process the world like the rest of us. We have had many opportunities for discussions of race lately, and I was sad for yet another tragedy to spark opportunity. She wanted to know about what happened to George Floyd. So I told her the truth, fighting every motherly instinct in me that wanted to protect her from it at the same time, wanting to shield her from it just as I had wanted to keep her from anxiety in the back of the car those many years ago.

The hardest part was the question she asked me as she processed it: Why did no one call for help? And I understood. I understood her instinct to think there must have been something else that can be done, there must have been some authority to call, there must have been someone else to intervene. After all, that’s what I’ve taught her from the youngest age. The police are our helpers. That’s who we call. They will protect us. They will make it better.

Which made it all the more painful, in this moment, to have to gently respond with another question: Who was there to call? If you call 911 when someone is being harmed, they send the police. In the case of George Floyd, the police were already there. The police were pinning George Floyd down. The police were ignoring his cries for help. The police were ensuring the bystanders stayed back and did not interfere. The bystanders, pleaded with the police officers to help George Floyd as he lay dying. The police did not. Who was there to call?

In recent years, I have often heard a quote from Fred Rogers referenced: “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’” I have thought of this quote many times when trying to help my children process the pain in this world. I thought of it as I sat there with my daughter. I thought to myself, who were the helpers in this story? All I could come up with is the bystanders who recorded this. The witnesses who said that this would not be forgotten, that everyone would know what happened in George Floyd’s last moments. They were brave. They were helpers. I pray to God their actions will help the next person. But they could not save George Floyd. It’s not enough.

I think of that story of my being pulled over by a police officer, and I think how easy it was for me to know what to say to my daughter in that situation. How clear it was that she needed to know that police officers are helpers. That she should cooperate with them whenever asked. That they are here to take care of us. That everything would be fine.

My heart is burdened by the knowledge that for many mothers, that conversation is not the same. That for parents of black sons, black children, the conversation can never be so simple. That at best, discussion of police officers must involve care and caution and must communicate a double-edged sword of protection vs. suspicion. And at worst, that discussion must include all-out fear. Warranted fear. And I ache.

From my place and position of safety as a white woman, a mother of white children, I ache. I ache to acknowledge the pain and fear of all of the mothers, all of the sons, all of the families out there who fear with no such position of safety provided by their skin. And so I pray, and I share my heart, and I pray for everyone crying out against this injustice, that these voices will be heard, and that our world will be changed. That if we all cry loudly enough against these injustices, we can be the helpers this world needs. I pray that one day, our voices will be enough.

Savoring the Moments

            My littlest headed off to kindergarten this fall, settling easily into his new routine.  Each morning he hangs his backpack on the hook in his coatroom and turns to me for a hug before striding confidently away.  For me, this daily goodbye signals an end to 13-1/2 years of being at home with little ones.  (I will admit that I have cheated a bit with my last little; I am only parting with him for half-day kindergarten, although full-day is the standard here.  We made this choice for reasons that (I think) benefit him, but a happy side effect is that my day is not quite as bereft of the little voices to which I have become so accustomed.)

            This transition is truly a bittersweet one, as all who have gone before me have prepared me to expect.  For years as I have juggled little ones through all stages, I have been reminded regularly to “Savor those moments! They won’t last forever!” These are instructions every young parent receives from seasoned veterans, and they can be a good reminder when the frustrations of parenthood seem overwhelming.  These well-intended directives can also be a frustration themselves.  When you are up to your elbows in diapers, tears, and tantrums, they can serve as another reminder of your failures.  “I should be savoring this moment. Why am I not savoring this moment?”

            As my last child begins the long journey of leaving, I can see the transient nature of these moments with a newly crystallized clarity.  Soon when I stub my toe, no one will run to get the doctor’s kit and give me a thorough examination, complete with shots and an exploration of my ears (just in case).  Is this the last time that I will hear a sweet little voice sing “Happy Birthday to Mommy” while handing me a wooden cake decorated with little painted candies? When will he start insisting on sitting next to me to read a book, instead of right in the middle of my lap so that I have to crane my neck around him to see the words? Will my heart break when he finally asks for “dessert” instead of “bessert”?

            I am fully aware, however, that I am able to experience such clarity now only due to the absence of the usual chaos surrounding us.  This phase is the bookend to the brief time with my oldest before she had any siblings to compete for attention.  How easy it was to soak in the moments when she was the only one.  How much harder it was when she brought me a birthday cake and wanted to sing to me while her newborn brother spit up down my front and screamed in my ear.  How often did a child attempt to give me a full checkup only to have it interrupted by the urgent needs of another child? I could hardly enjoy lying still on the couch with a stethoscope to my forehead when my toddler had just discovered the floor lamp across the room.  In these couple of hours alone each day with my last little one, I can see the difference so clearly.  It can still be hard embrace the moment over dishes or paperwork or other demands of daily life, but it is often impossible to do so over the other small people who are entirely dependent on you.

            With this recognition comes an understanding that I wish I had had earlier.  And maybe this applies to all parents of littles, regardless of how many you have.  Those constant reminders to savor? They aren’t wrong.  Savor!  Savor every moment that you can! Savor the ones that just happen to fall during a time when younger ones are napping, or older ones are at school, or during five miraculous minutes when no one is screaming or demanding anything extra of you!  Those moments do happen, albeit brief and fleeting.  But don’t sweat the moments when you can’t stop to savor.  You are not a failure if you don’t feel magic in every moment.  It may be true that in another 10 years he won’t be driving matchbox cars up your legs with zooming sounds, and you will miss the sweetness of it.  That doesn’t mean that you are capable of admiring it while you are trying to walk his baby brother to sleep, nearly tripping over him with every step. 

            Just savor when you can, and know that more opportunities will come.  Fully enjoying these moments with my littlest somehow feels like savoring the moments from all of my kids at once.  It is being in the moment and remembering the past and experiencing the magic of both all at once. It is a final parting gift from all of their childhoods, and I will soak it in as long as I can.

On Our 16th Anniversary

When we married in 2000, my husband whisked me off on a surprise honeymoon to Paris. Everyone always wants to know if I was really surprised. As proof, I produce photos of me in front of every Parisian landmark wearing the hiking shorts and T-shirts I had packed for the week I thought we were spending in the Smoky Mountains. But let’s face it – I would have stood out as a tourist regardless. Planning the surprise also involved my soon-to-be-spouse contacting my brand new boss ahead of time to ask for a few extra days off, which I had no knowledge of until afterwards. The grins on all of my coworkers’ faces when I returned were something! For all practical purposes, I had never left the country before. Exploring all of the sights, tastes, and smells of France with my new husband made for a fairy tale start to our marriage.

As an encore, in 2001 my husband surprised me with a weekend trip to Washington, D.C. for our first anniversary. We trekked all over the town in 80+ degree weather and sweltering humidity (did I mention we were married in August?), not wanting to miss a single sight. This time my boss was surprised when I called on a Monday morning to tell her the flight that I hadn’t known about the week before had been delayed, and therefore I would miss a day of work. Luckily I had a very understanding boss; she didn’t begrudge me the memories we made.

On our fifth anniversary we loaded up our four-month-old daughter and took off on one of our first trips as a threesome to see friends a few hours away. We had dinner in the family-friendly Spaghetti Factory on the way up, enjoying the rare dinner out together while still constantly cautious and attentive to our new baby’s every need.

For our tenth anniversary we dropped our five- and three-year-old children with my parents and spent the weekend at the coast with our still-nursing baby. We were less overly-concerned about finding just the right spot to change a diaper with our third child. It was almost romantic.

For our thirteenth anniversary we did the same, this time dropping three older kids and taking along another baby for a weekend away. This particular baby didn’t sleep for more than an hour at a time at night for his first seven months, so the whole weekend was spent in a big of a haze. I still have pictures of us smiling to prove we at least attempted to enjoy each other’s company.

Last year was our fifteenth anniversary. Quite the milestone, really. 15 years, seven (?) jobs between us (not counting various titles tried on as my husband worked out the fits and starts of starting a business), four children, three cats, and three addresses later. To be honest we didn’t really do anything to mark the occasion last year. We talked about planning something big, but as it turned out we already had a year filled with wonderful and surprising travel opportunities that simply didn’t leave room for a trip of our own. And that was okay. We were quite happy to have our adventures handed to us, even if we had to take on some of them separately.

Today marks our sixteenth wedding anniversary. Like most summer days, I am spending it at home with all four children. It’s supposed to be 97 degrees today, so we headed out early to pick blackberries around the neighborhood. After about 5 minutes we had to quickly dash home, as the littlest guy developed what I will politely refer to as “digestive issues.” This led to a rather fun morning of urgent bathroom trips and outfit changes. It also made the older children mad at me for cutting the blackberry picking short. My daughter is getting braces next week, and is adjusting to the discomfort of the spacers that are preparing her teeth. (Let’s just say she is not one to embrace discomfort.) My oldest son contributed to the day by falling out of a tree (don’t worry – low branch,) and shortly after tripped over his own feet, resulting in multiple scrapes and bruises today. (Can we say “growth spurt”?) The children resorted to arts and crafts, and now my middle son is mad at me for letting his little brother use too much tape. (All of this may have led me to hide out and start typing. You can’t pick what prompts the creative process.)

Tonight my husband and I will feed the kids something terribly uninspired for dinner, like chicken nuggets or mac and cheese. After we get them tucked into bed we will order take out and eat it on the couch. (The dining room table that we used to share candlelight meals over is now associated with the tiring dance of getting everyone to sit together and eat neatly and interact politely day in and day out). Then perhaps we will watch a movie, or maybe sit out on the porch swing and listen to the hum of our surroundings as evening sets. Perhaps we will talk about our day. Perhaps not. There is never a way to do so without discussing other people’s bodily functions, but we are used to that.

The rhythm of life is different these days. It’s different from when we were on our own, young and carefree to too immature to know that we were either. It’s different from when we had our first baby, elated and exhausted and concentrated on learning the ropes of our new reality. It’s different from when we had a house full of preschoolers, toddlers, and babies, an intensely loud, crazy, and all-encompassing world with survival as the only goal. Now we have a preschooler and a preteen and everything in-between. It’s a world I never imagined, where I bounce back and forth between addressing small child frustrations and big kid emotions, unsure if I’ve really mastered either myself. It’s a world where big kids’ activities have infringed on the autonomy of our own schedules, once again revealing the loss of a freedom I never truly recognized we had. For every gain in a child’s abilities that moves him closer to independence, there appears to be a new crossroad that arises, one that I know requires my full attention to navigate but that I feel ill-equipped to address while still chasing a 3-year-old across a parking lot. In a word, it’s complicated.

And so sharing a pizza laden with grown-up toppings (please let it be anything but pepperoni or Hawaiian!) on the couch at 8pm on our anniversary doesn’t feel like a cop-out or a letdown in this phase of life. It feels like a comfort, a constant, something that is still within our control as nearly everything else spirals out of it. It’s not a big trip or a feeling of young romance. But while the daily rhythms change, the undercurrent stays the same. The joy (and relief) I feel when my husband walks in at the end of the day, once again mine to share life with for the next few hours. Once again mine. A theme that repeats itself through the years, but never becomes any less. The excitement I still feel looking forward to the moment when all of the children are settled upstairs and we can rest in each other’s company alone, uninterrupted aside from the vague sounds of thunking above. The peace of sharing a meal with someone who demands nothing from you in that moment except quiet companionship. The understanding that 16 years of marriage has built between us.

        If to some of you this seems like I have given up on having adventures as a couple, don’t worry, I haven’t. Even as I embrace pizza on the couch, I continue to dream and plan for the future. The places we will go, the things we will do. Some of them are years off, some decades even, but some of them will just require a little planning. 

I took this picture while we were camping last year. As I looked back through the photos, I wondered why I had taken it. It’s not a particularly spectacular picture for sure. To some it might seem lonely, two empty chairs. When I took it I was passing by with a toddler in the child seat on the back of my bike, three other children biking behind me as we circled the lake. Back in our tent my husband slept, sick. That is our life now, and it has its own exhausting beauty. But when I see this scene, the little table for two, I picture us sitting there. And I think, as I do nearly every time I see a little café table for two, “Someday we will be somewhere like this, just the two of us. I can’t wait to sit at a table like this together, looking across a lake, soaking in this beauty.” This is what I celebrate today. Seeing two chairs on a lake and picturing the two of us in them, and having that fill my heart with joy. Knowing how much we will appreciate that moment when it comes. Sharing a life that fills me with joyful anticipation. This is how I know we are doing okay.  

Random Thoughts on Pokémon

When my oldest son was three, the Disney Cars movie had recently come out and the die-cast Cars characters were all the rage.  Ben had only recently potty trained, in his case entirely motivated by the reward of a new Hot Wheel every time he completed a line on his potty sticker chart.  He had loved cars and trucks and all things wheeled for quite a while.  We already had an extensive collection of little metal vehicles, and I was hesitant at first to jump on the Disney Cars bandwagon.  He was only my second child, and I still clung to some new-parent ideals of avoiding commercialization of toys.  But as any parent knows, your children will manage to collect those little commercialized toys whether you buy them or not. 

To my surprise, as his collection grew I found myself getting into the excitement of it as well.  I found joy in watching Ben spend hours carefully lining all of his cars up in perfect order.  Our family room rug became a race track.  He called them “Eye Cars” (since unlike Hot Wheels, they have eyes on their windshields).  He knew them all by name, and soon I did, too.  The months before Christmas that year found me delighting every time I found a Car we didn’t have hanging on a store shelf or featured on an Amazon page.  Soon there was a small but deliberate stash of Cars waiting to make his collection more complete on a near December morning.   I was invested.  The Cars had become family.

And so it felt far too soon when he went off to kindergarten and came home with the pronouncement that he now loved Star Wars.  Star Wars?  I consider myself a fan too, but then I have actually seen the movies.  But Ben?  He has no Star Wars books or movies.  He’s never even seen a Star Wars cartoon.  How could he suddenly “love” Star Wars?  And yet he did.  Almost as though a latent gene had been activated upon him turning 5-and-a-half, there it was.  And it didn’t matter what he lacked in knowledge.  He came home from school with drawing after drawing of characters whose names he had learned from his friends.  They fought each other with slingshots, because he had not yet discovered light sabers.  And the Cars began to be cast aside, replaced by Star Wars LEGOs and action figures.   And while I had enjoyed the original trilogy and suffered through the second trilogy, I was never one who could name every planet or more than the handful of main characters.  The parts of my brain that had expanded to welcome the entire Radiator Springs community into memory somehow could not grasp the difference between a clone trooper and a storm trooper.  I couldn’t share in this world.  And my heart broke a little. 

However, we added two more boys to the family, and I had hopes of reliving the little boy years all over again.  That’s what I thought would happen.  But it turns out that once you have gone through those years the first time, they don’t quite repeat with the younger children.  Those transitions are commandeered by their older mentors.  When Ben was into Star Wars, Andrew was two years old, and then turning three.  With big brother as his hero, he barely glanced at the Cars that were collecting dust in the corners.  His Star Wars collection grew along with Ben’s.  They turned everything they could find into light sabers to battle with.  Andrew’s drawings never mistakenly featured slingshots.  At three, Andrew was already turning six.

Cars gave way to Star Wars.  Star Wars turned to Mario and Mario became  Ninjago.  And then one day Ben was invited to a Pokémon-themed birthday party.  While I at least get the main points of Star Wars, Pokémon has never been part of my knowledge base.   I have now seen multiple episodes of Pokémon cartoons, and still I am unable to make even the slightest sense of this world.  After asking the boys for explanations over and over, I have finally memorized the following phrase:  “Pokémon are mythical creatures with elemental powers who battle each other.”  And I probably have that phrase wrong, too.  The only one I can name is Pikachu, since he loudly graces my son’s T-shirt.  Ben and Andrew live in this reality without me now.  And I refrain from pointing out that their entire Pokémon collections that they spend every dime they have on are, in fact, just pieces of paper with drawings of pretend animals on them.  It wouldn’t help.  They would just roll their eyes at my inability to distinguish been a DX and an EX, which to me are the names of models of the Honda Civic we own.  So I stay out of those discussions and instead play spaceships and rockets with Will, my current three-year-old who is obsessed with vehicles of all kinds.  He doesn’t know any of the Cars names, but I could still hold out hope that he might soon.

That hope did not last long.  The other day while I was making dinner, Ben gave Will three of his apparently unimportant Pokémon cards.  He told his brother to take good care of them, and that if he does he will get more cards.  Will came running over holding the cards with such delight!  “Look Mom, Ben gave me Pokémons!”  My insides wrenched a little as I congratulated him and attempted to share in his joy.  He is only three, and the odds that he will take care of these paper cards for long are not good.  And this held true over the next few days, as they were left in various parts of the house and he only occasionally thought to look for them.  I nearly breathed a sigh of relief.  Until this morning, when he came running out holding his still well-kept cards and rattling off the names of each Pokémon character that they represented.  Even I can see now that the battle has been lost. 

The truth is my days of enjoying a preschool boy were left behind with Ben.  It turns out that there really are no do-overs in parenting, even if you add more children.  Whatever age the oldest turns, that is effectively the age that all of my boys will be.  Never again will I have a three-year-old, but this year I will have three 9-year-olds.  And it’s a little sad to me, that I will never share in their little preschool world again.  But instead I look to the new joys.  The joy of watching Ben share his latest love with his littlest brother, and even attempting to throw in a lesson on responsibility in the process.  The joy of watching Andrew work to catch up with or even bypass Ben in all of the interests they share.  The joy of watching Will, eyes wide with wonder that Ben has entrusted him with something so precious.  Nowhere in those joys does it matter whether the subject is Lightning McQueen or Pikachu.  In that small fact, hope remains.

My Grandma

My grandmother passed away this week at the accomplished age of 91.  We have known for a while that this day was nearing, but I still find it hard to accept that the world could go on without her.  She has been a big part of my life for so long.
  
I remember telling all of my friends at an early age that my grandma was the coolest, because she wore a jean jacket.  I mean, whose grandma wears a jeans jacket?  Mine did.  Her name was Jean, so really it just made sense.  Some children’s literature could lead you to believe that grandmothers are frumpy and grouchy and funny smelling, but my grandma was none of those things.  She was active and fun and beautiful, and always, always kind.

My childhood memories of her often dwell on summers at my grandparents’ house.  Playing pick-up sticks in the sun room on a warm day.  Watching squirrels fly across the wires over their back yard.  Playing hide and seek in the big stand of evergreens.  If I pause for a moment, I can still hear the creaking of the curving steps that led to their attic.  I can feel the warm, sticky heat and inhale the faintly musty attic air.  (It was only a few years ago that I learned that the musty odor belonged to mothballs.  I have always known that scent as “Grandpa and Grandma’s attic.”  The scent of mothballs will always make me feel happy and comforted and loved.)  I can see the rows of trunks, filled with wonderful treasures that were ours to play with.  One of those trunks lives in my storage area now.  My children think it’s a pirate chest.  I don’t deprive them of this magic.

When I was ten years old, I had the opportunity to stay with my grandparents for a week- just me!  For a middle child, this was a dream come true.  They gave me freedoms that only grandparents could allow.

They let me stay up as late as I wanted, every night!  This was an amazing treat.  It probably only took one night of sitting alone in a quiet house after my grandparents went to bed to discover that there was nothing special in going to bed late.  This is when I learned that, at age 10, there really is nothing to do after 8:30 anyway.

They let me eat my favorite food, hot dogs, for lunch every day.  This is when I learned that there is such a thing as enough hot dogs.  

My grandma took me to the station where she served as an EMT.  We brought cookies that we had baked for the public servants who worked there.  She took me to her morning exercise class, one of the few times in life that I got out of bed at 6:00am voluntarily.  Everywhere we went, she introduced me so proudly.  But what I most remember is how she introduced others.  I don’t remember all of the many people that Grandma introduced to me in her lifetime, but I do remember how she introduced each one with a sincere statement of appreciation for how that person made her life better.  This is when I learned what a beautiful thing it is to truly value others.

I know that in her later years, as her body started to wear down, Grandma struggled with feeling that she was no longer useful to others.  The truth is that she made a difference in all of our lives, right up until the end.  When Sophie was 2-1/2 and Ben was 8 months old, I got it in my head that I was going to sew an elephant costume for Sophie for Halloween.  (Keep in mind that I don’t sew.  And that elephants are complicated.  They have trunks.)  Grandma was out for a visit in early October of that year.  She wasn’t doing very much sewing of her own anymore.  But she sat at the kitchen table with me for the better part of a day.  She taught me how to read a pattern, and guided me through sewing the first pieces together.  Her lessons allowed me to finish the costume after she flew home, and it turned out even better than I could have imagined!  Since then I have produced bear, puppy, and Snow White costumes, in addition to many mending projects.

Even as it became harder for her to write, Grandma continued to send personal handwritten notes to each of us for every occasion.  She never failed to tell me how proud she was of me, how much she thinks of what I am doing.  When you leave the working world to stay home with your kids, there aren’t many opportunities to receive recognition.  This validation from the grandmother I admire so much, who raised five amazing kids of her own as well as contributing to the world in many other ways, meant more to me than she could have known.

In addition to encouraging me, Grandma delighted in loving my kids and telling them how proud she was of them, too.  In her last weeks, she spent less and less time awake and engaged.  My kids would often ask how she was doing, and at one point they sent her a book that they wrote and illustrated.  They included a dedication page, which said “This is to my Great-Grandma.  Written with care from Sophia and Illustrated very carefully by Benjamin.”  My Aunt Kathy and Uncle Alan, her constant companions, read it to her, and reported that she said “Wonderful!” several times.  Even this simple word relayed to them was enough to make my kids feel so special and important.

I can’t tell you how much I will miss my grandma.  To me she was a brightly shining light, and the world seems darker without her.  My comfort is in seeing the best parts of her live on through her children (my fantastic parents and aunts and uncles) as well as many others that she touched.   I hope that some of her lives on in me too, and that I will be able to share some of her gifts with my own children.  And on days when I feel dim I can look at the notes she wrote me, and grow a little brighter again.

The Perfect Mother’s Day Gift

My kids are amazingly sweet and thoughtful gift-givers.  They often start planning weeks ahead for the perfect present, and they come up with the most creative ideas.  (There are photos of my birthday present from them still waiting to be posted…you will be amazed!)  

This Mother’s Day was no exception.  I have heard whispers for a couple of weeks now about a gift in the works.  They are even getting better at the art of secrecy, and I had no idea what was in store for me this time.  All I knew was that Sophie, Ben, and Andrew were all in on this one.  

At the appointed time today, I was asked to wait in the family room for their arrival.  Damien sat next to me with the video camera ready to go.  Moments later, in came Andrew, wearing a homemade paper mask in the shape of a seed.  Next followed Ben, wearing a gardener’s hat.  Next followed Sophie, who handed me a program for their play, The Growing Flower, put out props, and reviewed the script before they began.  It was all incredibly perfect, except…

Remember when I mentioned Andrew coming in with a paper mask on his face?  What I didn’t mention was that he came in and flung himself down on the floor, loudly whining and crying for indiscernible reasons.  Sophie started yelling as she prepared the scene.  (“Boys, it’s not ready and you know it!”  “I can’t have him whining this whole time!”)  Ben stood apart with an innocent look, although there were allegations that he provoked Andrew.

Several minutes were spent trying to coax Andrew out of the tantrum.  (“Come on, Little Seed!  Show us what you can do!)  The play started briefly, and then Andrew dropped to the floor and continued his tantrum because he couldn’t see out of his mask.  Sophie showed surprising maturity as director by telling Andrew that he could just skip the mask, and eventually agreeing to play his parts for him.  Still, frustration was apparent all around.  After multiple attempts to turn it around, Andrew finally had to be carted off to his room because he couldn’t even calm down enough to watch the play with us.

All of this was caught on film.  The tantrums, the screaming, the tears, the blaming each other.  Our less-than-perfect parenting attempts to deal with a 3-year-old's tantrum.  And finally, the play itself, although it was in modified form by this point.  (It was the life cycle of a flower, with different masks for the seed, the sprout, the flower, rain, and the sun.  There was even a set with a brown blanket for dirt, and confetti rain!)

And you know what?  It really was perfect.  In fact, having this little slice of life caught on camera was the best gift that they could have given me.  We record many moments of our lives, but never the disastrous ones.  I don’t stop to pick up the video camera when kids fight and throw fits.  I don’t record the times when I send them to time out or take away privileges.  We record the fun times, the successes, the school programs and other orchestrated cuteness, the parts that make it all worthwhile, as we should.  But some day this phase of life will be long gone, and I won’t be able to fully remember what it was like.  I won’t remember their angry little voices, or their cries of frustration.  I won’t want to relive it full-time, but I might just want a glimpse.  

If it were a different day, all of the yelling and fighting and disasters might have been too much for me, and it might have put me in a bad mood, too.  But I had a restful day today, which allowed me a better sense of perspective.  And as the melt-down happened all around us, I found myself checking with Damien to make sure that the camera was still on.  Because for just a brief moment, I looked into my future.  A future where I hope to be rested more of the time.  I pictured myself watching this scene when my kids are grown and gone.  I pictured laughing until I cried, and hitting play again.  And I was so, so grateful to have this precious, unplanned moment captured.  Our family, just as it is right now.  It really was the perfect gift.

Conversations with My Two-Year-Old

This fall I wrote down a series of conversations with my two-year-old that both amazed and entertained me.  These all took place two to three months before his third birthday.  We have had many amazing conversations since then, but at some point even the extraordinary things your child says start to become ordinary when shared on a daily basis, and you fail to write down each individual interaction.  Which is why I am glad to have captured these!

While attending a chapel service.  Andrew is entertaining himself by writing on the little slips of paper for prayer requests.
Andrew:  Can I write your name?
Me:  Sure.
A:  Should I do V and D and N-I-O-Z?
M:  Sure.
A:  Okay!  (Makes a series of scribbles on the paper and hands it to me.)
A (pulling out another paper):  I need another gift card! 

While his siblings are at school.
A:  Mommy, there’s only one boy left in this house.
M:  That’s true.
A:  Mommy, this boy needs to go to school.

Out of the blue, while around the house.
A:  Mommy, I want to do haircut for cats.
M:  You want to give the cats a haircut?
A:  Yeah.
M:  Um…we don’t actually cut kitties’ hair, Hon.
A:  Can we beard them?
M:  BEARD them?
A:  Yeah.
M:  Like…give them beards?
A:  Yeah.
M:  No, I don’t think we can do that, either.

While loading into the car.
A:  Mommy, can I have medicine?
M: No, you’re not sick.  You don’t need medicine.
A:  Medicine for whining.
M:  Medicine for whining?
A:  Yeah.  
M:  I wish, Buddy…I wish. 

Walking to the store.  It is chilly out.
A:  Why is it cold?
M:  It just is.
A:  Is the sun out?
M:  Yes, the sun’s out.  It’s just still cold.
A:  Is it cloudy?
M:  Nope – just cold.
A:  Why?  
M:  Because winter’s coming.
A:  Winter’s coming.
M:  Yup.
(Pause.)
A:  I heard Winter coming.
M:  Did you?
(Pause.)
A (gleefully): I saw Winter’s eyes!
M:  You did?
A:  Yes!  He said, “Hi, I’m Winter!”

A conversation repeated in many iterations this fall, usually in the parking lot of a grocery store.
M:  Okay, Andrew, it’s time to get out of the car.
A:  Why?
M:  Because we need to go in the grocery store and get a few things.
A:  Why? 
M:  Because Mommy needs some food in order to make dinner.
A:  Why?
M:  Because.
A:  Did God tell you to?
M:  To get the specific items on my grocery list?  Um…I guess not...