The day begins...

Morning starts a brand new day, and I am woken by a small son and a bigger son, and we go downstairs.  My coffee flows down, liquid warmth, and slowly my brain begins to function.  This morning I find myself thinking random phrases, putting into unending run-on sentences a description of what goes on around me. 

I slice peaches and bananas to feed these hungry few, and I think about the hungry many that I read about on the Internet.  The TV plays in the background as my hands get covered in slimy mess - peaches are hard to cut when they've been peeled - and I peek out the window to see two small birds hopping around on the grass outside under the birch tree.  A gift?

Interruptions are a constant part of the every day.  Children are hungry, bored, tired, just need a cuddle.  I pick up this small one, now finished his breakfast, and we walk to the toy room.  He leans his head on my shoulder, and we look out the window to the backyard together.  He loves to look outside, and the wonder on his face as he sees God's creation melts my hearts.  "Paaa," he whispers, because that's his answer to everything.  I leave him standing at the door as I try to come back and put the words onto paper that fill my head with a constant flowing stream.

I stir the oatmeal.  I notice that the clock on the stove reads exactly 7:00 as I wonder how it's possible to feel so extremely lonely while at the same time just wanting to run away from it all and become a hermit.

Life is hard, and the encouragement from those around and those online helps, but there is still this day to day living and the plodding on one day, one step, one moment at a time.

I watch this little one as he plays with a ball, pick it up, put it down, watch it roll away and chase after it.  His smile and curiosity brings such joy...

I reach for the forgotten oatmeal, not quite yet burned, but definitely done, and I find myself noticing how this allowing myself to think in sentences helps to find the grace in the small things.  It slows my brain to think with words instead of feelings and reactions, and it becomes easier to live in the moment because life suddenly isn't an emergency, but this naming of it all...yes...that is what this is, and Ann speaks of it in the "One Thousand Gifts Devotional", page 57, how naming gives identity and meaning and solves mysteries.

I wish I could say this is easy to keep doing.  But the truth is that to keep my braining running on like this is also tiring, and I have limited stores of energy in my sleep deprived state.  So for this morning, I enjoy these brief moments of higher functioning.  Too soon, the children spill from the living room to the kitchen, words running cacophony, jumbled, drowning out whatever thoughts still percolate, and I'm back to reacting, providing for needs, one moment at a time.