Thank You

Yesterday I took Lilian for a mid-day walk.  Every now and again, I will just take her out sans any modern carrier, stroller or other such contraption.  I just sweep her up in my arms and carry her out.  I love doing this.  The simplicity of it; the toughness of it; the sweet closeness of it - the fact that there is nothing except a couple of thin layers of cloth between us.  I feel like a real mom when I do this and I instantly feel connected to women throughout the ages.

But don't get me wrong.  It is hard work.  It is easy to be romantic about babyhood.  The tiny clothes and sweet, soft skin, even the smell of diapers (Mom.)  But it is hard and rarely if ever glamorous work.  Well, this little angel swept along the path yesterday.  She broke her power walk stride to say this to me just as I was swinging Lilian off of my hip and onto the ground so she could do some practice walking (the polar opposite of power walking), "Well, you don't have a free moment in the day . . . thank you for the work that you are doing."  And she kept on; head held high, slight smile across her glistening face.

I allowed the hot breeze to rush over me in that moment and again I felt connected.  She was thanking me for raising a child; for doing my best everyday to encourage and teach and be there and let go. She reminded me that this short mid-day walk with nothing but my keys and Lilian mattered and was, in fact, enough.  

Good Hard Work

Well, despite my last post, here it is: a picture of the fairy garden (this in its second rendition.)  Oh, the joy that Francesca emits while working on these tiny doors and windows made out popsicle sticks and straws.  It is utterly palpable.  It is as if she is going to jump out of her skin from excitement.  And oh how she listens to her  dad as he explains why and how things are being put together.  During the first making of this fairy home (the first go around was sadly destroyed the night after it was made by a rain and wind storm; talk about a lesson in not grasping!) Francesca exclaimed with the same utter joy, "this is hard work."  Matt replied, "yes, hard work is fun sometimes."

When I was in graduate school we would talk about this concept of flow - you know, when the kid is both challenged and successful.  And we talk about it in terms of athletics and yoga and perhaps even meditation.  To me, Francesca making this fairy garden was a textbook example of this notion of flow . . .this happiness that comes from good hard work.

Concurrently, I was reading My Life in France by Julia Child (read it!) and was so taken with this exact experience that Julia had when she discovered cooking.  The delight that she felt from finding something that she loved so much - good hard work - flew off the page at every turn.

I think about work a lot these days of "not working" (although the work of parenting is often good hard work) and this is all that I could want for myself, my children, all the people of the world: that they are absorbed by whatever it is that they are doing and are more often than not able to feel that flow.  And if not, well, go make a fairy garden.