"This morning we woke up to our first snow of the year. A thin blanket of white covered the strawberry plant outside the living room window. When we got downstairs for breakfast, my daughters were so enthralled and surprised by the snow that they didn’t immediately run into the kitchen to help me pour their cereal. I stopped for a moment to remember that when life gives me lemons, my daughters are sweet enough to turn it into lemonade.
A few months ago, my car broke as I was driving to the daycare to pick up my daughters. As the shimmying and shaking grew worse, I grew more concerned about how much it would cost to fix it and how we would get by with just one car while it was in the shop. I warned my girls about the car and told them we were going to go to the car shop instead of going home. When I started driving, they both squealed in joy and excitement, and my four-year-old called it a rollercoaster ride. This little bit of perspective helped calm my fears and reminded me to take a breath and relax.
The recent time change now means that it’s dark out when I get to the daycare in the evening. To me, this usually means that I have spent another day working inside, and that I haven’t seen the sun since my morning eastward commute. But to my daughters, it means that they get to see the moon during our drive home. They talk to the moon, comment on what shape it is, and strive to see it on their side of the car. Because of their ability to find joy in things as common as the moon, I am no longer annoyed that the days are so short and that I have to spend them inside. Instead, I am reminded that there is just as much beauty in the night sky as there is during the day.
This holiday season, I want to remember to search out the joy in mundane circumstances and find perspective within my fears."
1 comment:
What a great post. So true that innocence is such a loss in adulthood because we become unable to see the simple things of joy.
Post a Comment