Bits and Pieces of This and That

There is nothing particularly special about this picture. It was taken several days ago -- poorly posed and in poor lighting. Still, I find myself looking at it. Repeatedly.

There seems to be some message for me in it: some message about my life – what it is now, what it’s always been, and what it’s becoming. A message of hope and blessing and connection. The people in that image? They are mine. And I am theirs. Our existences are all intertwined. Our spheres all . . . full of one another. We love each other. We really like each other. And . . . that group is, amazingly, only a small small part of “us” – of those we claim. Why, only HALF of my siblings are even in this picture. I just keep looking at it. And thinking.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am driving Abe home from violin lessons. There is a song playing (though what it was I’ve now forgotten).

Abe sighs and says, “Don’t you wish our lives had background music?”

“Yes,” I say. “Yes I do.”

“And that only our upper jaws moved?” Abe sneaks in (with a clever little smile).

“Yes,” I agree, without a pause. “I do wish that. Of all the things I wish, that is the thing I most wish for.”

Also, he’s always claiming to be taller than me. He never is. But recently . . . his claim has become harder to refute.

No small feat (perhaps I should have said feet) since I am 5’11”. Of course . . . he’s standing very military-like . . . and my head is kind of less “at attention”. So I think I’ve still got him beat.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Talking to Penny.

Me: Soon you’ll be all grown up and that will be crazy.

Pen: I’ll visit you every day! Well . . . every . . . three times a week. Unless . . . I move to Pennsylvania. . . . Then . . . (and she shrugs – as if to say – “you’re out of luck”).

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Jesse pulls open our sliding glass door and tromps in – pulling off gloves and tracking snow in his wake. “Mom,” he tells me, offhandedly, “I thought Anders would like me to throw a snowball at him, but . . . he didn’t.”

Those boys. They are best friends and worst enemies -- on repeat -- all day long.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Goldie really loves some particularly great things. Like . . . really loves. The three small cacti we gave her for Christmas are cherished (and the one that “didn’t make it” had to be officially buried and mourned – after all, he had a name). There is also little on earth that makes her as happy as a pomegranate or a pineapple. She could scarcely believe when I let her get a pineapple at the store the other day. She is always finding awesome things to take to birthday parties for her friends – like small bamboo plants. It’s kind of dear somehow.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

And . . . a few random pictures. Summer mastering the art of “sitting up” (it opens a whole new wondrous world), playing at Bear Lake with cousins, and other bits of this and that.