There is nothing quite like spending a day full of delight to fill a person with wonder! And the best way to accomplish that is to spend the day looking through the eyes of a child.
And that is how I spent my afternoon.
But, it didn’t start out that way.
We joined a family that we know through our daughter’s swim coaching, at their nearby campsite. The drive there was not all that delightful. Our eleven-year old son, and fourteen year old daughter had enough tension and complaining and arguing between them to start WW3! I finally threatened (oh, yes, I threatened … I reached parental boiling point from which there is no sense, and no turning back), that if they did not act as expected (and no, I did not define what was expected), they would be in trouble (and no, I did not define what the trouble was). And silence overcame the van (as hubby was making yet another UTurn, with the hopes that he was finally heading in the direction that “I was sure we needed to go” … it was not a stellar start to the day for me, relationally, with my family).
From the moment we arrived, the mood and minds and hearts that exited the van were very different from before we emerged from it’s frame.
We greeted our hostess, and wandered through the campground to locate the dad, and their kids. When we found each other, their children (a boy of five, and daughter of seven) came running with open arms towards my fourteen year old daughter, and I.
We returned to their site to have introductions made (as hubby one and hubby two had not met before), and smokies put on the fire.
For about two and a half hours we chatted, giggled, ate, took pictures, watched the kids ride bikes, eat smores with the most humongous marshmallows ever, and giggle some more. And then, we went to the beach.
For the next two and a half hours the four ‘kids’ spent jumping waves, building sandcastles, falling into frigid Northwest coastal waters, burying their feet, running into and out of the waves, and more giggling. And this is where transformations began …
All four of the kids (aged five, seven, eleven, and fourteen) p l a y e d like … kids.
The older two were no longer playing at playing, for the sake of the younger ones. The older two were as fully engaged in their own imaginations as were the younger two. They buried their feet deep into the sand, because the effects of the water rushing over the sand caused wonder for them. They jumped into the waves, not just because they were trying to steady the little bodies attached to the hands that they were holding, but because they were experiencing joy in trying to outsmart the nature of the waves. They built sandcastles, not because they were assisting the construction of the dreams of the younger children, but because they were building out the dreams of their own imaginations.
They were fully engaged in the delight of wonder … as the little children were, and as were the four parents, watching a few feet away.
We said our goodbyes, and drove the half hour trip back to our vacation home. And our drive home …
Our eleven and fourteen year old talked together, sang together, laughed together, and … delighted in the wonder that was planted by the seeds of children. Those children who were just being themselves, and who reminded all of us that we are never too old to play.
my soul is singing “Creation Calls” as tears fall, without sorrow down my cheeks.
Then, after a time of songs and sighs, I move on … the call continues.
to it, to be close to it, to physically touch it to confirm my reliance on reaching out to it.
And I reach out,
and a beach (that you can walk to eliminate some of the delicious calories you’ve taken in).
Finally, after ten months of school, and then spending June and July working at a second job, I am able to really enjoy my garden!
Yesterday I spent the day in the garden. I was pruning, and mowing, and trimming, and watering, and weeding, and feeding. It was glorious! I got filthy dirty (I do not even seem to be able to water my flowers without getting dirty), and used muscles that ached the next day (heck, they ached as they were being used), and not one minute of it seemed like work.
color they are, until finally they open up to reveal the beauty within. And oh, how I love to see the springtime buds on the grapevine, emerge into tendrils that reach far from where they began, to be followed by the minute clusters of ‘baby grapes’ that, like a newborn baby, grow bigger every day of summer, until they are finally mature, and ready to be tasted.
My garden is where I am Mother Nature, and my goal is to protect everything I love within my garden … it is truly a place where I am a mother hen figure. But, I am sadly not able to protect my green ‘babies’ all of the time.
This weight loss stuff is quite the journey … really more like a slow motion video than a journey. Back in January I began this process (no, this was not a New Years Resolution, it was more of a response to the fact that my hubby was dropping pounds like my beast drops poo! So I figured I better keep up with his fine example … it might have also been in response to that ‘sweety’ at church who said, “so have you been finding all that weight your husband has been losing?” … deep breaths … deep breaths … deep breaths! But, I digress).
The change room reminded me of a retail clothing store … four ‘closets’, each with a curtain for a door, and a low shelf in each brimming with magazines. I followed ‘pink lady’ #1’s instructions … and waited … and waited. And listened … there was a screening being done on another lady … I could hear some of the instructions … ‘lay your purse on the chair’, ‘come over here’ and then the instructions mimicked the teacher’s voice from Charlie Brown comics.
itsawonderfilledlife 