Rainy days and Mondays don’t always get me down but they sure make me sleepy. Especially when the rainy day is a gloomy, chilly Monday in late fall. The laundry was folded and put away. The kitchen floor was mopped due to heavy weekend traffic. The guest bedroom sheets were changed. The Bible study that I teach was prepared and the homework for the Bible study that I attend was completed so, at 3:45 on this particularMarch afternoon, I plopped on the couch with a Time magazine. I knew the house would come alive with dramatic stories, snacks, homework, permission slips and the like at 4:02, as it does every weekday. Lord, let these 17 minutes stretch in a supernatural way. As a matter of fact, please stop the time Lord. You’ve done it before. I really need a good naaa……..
Raindrops were rolling down the den windows. Wind was blowing. Branches were swaying. Leaves were falling. The house let out an occasional “creak.” I read two lines and fell fast asleep. I was down for the count. As you may have guessed, the Lord did not answer my prayer. In what seemed like a minute later, the front door flew open with an announcement from our gregarious son Jordan. “Maaaaaaa! We’re Ho-o-ome!” I can always count on the little guy for a bear hug. My daughter Paris had become a sophisticated pre-adolesent. She came to the outer rim of my personal space and whispered “Hello Mother,” without making eye contact. Following closely behind, as is her lot in life, was my baby. Capri had finally turned six after what seemed like an eternity of being stuck at five and a half.
Along with energizing me and bringing our home much joy and laughter, Capri makes me even more tired than rainy days and Mondays. She knows what she wants and when she wants it. She doesn’t let the big kids pull anything over on her. She chooses items at the supermarket and places them in the cart. (The older two would NEVER have tried this.) She refuses to kiss friends and relatives on command. She is the one with a heavy Brooklyn accent even though she left New York when she was two. And with that accent, she tells people what she thinks of them and how they smell.This is the child that has me re-reading Dobson’s best sellers. That particular day was like all others in that she dropped her coat in the foyer, her backpack in the entrance of the den and her well guarded, hand held artwork on the coffee table. She shunned her big girl persona and reverted to playing baby of the house; Mommy, Mommy, I missed you Mommy.” Her thumb went into her mouth and she climbed on top of me. We cuddled for a blissful moment. Her thumb got a brief repreive.
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