How would your life look different if there were do-overs? I think it's easy to say we wouldn't do anything differently if given the chance, but is that really true? Maybe in the big picture it's true, but I've been struggling with these thoughts a lot lately. The truth for me is that I would do quite a few things drastically different.
On my third week home with the kids (or maybe the fourth? Shoot - I don't even know what day it is today to be honest!) I came to a startling realization: I had missed the very best part of my kids for four years. Not that the best part of them was gone, but that in our busyness of life, we got the leftovers. We only saw them at the worst, orneriest, most tired moments... and let me tell you- that's not pretty!
It happened one day while Cam was playing with his trains and out of nowhere, stopped what he was doing just to run over and give me the biggest hug and kiss. And then go right back to trains. That was immediately followed by Claire making some sweet comment expressing that she loved me too and was glad we could play today. And those two things were immediately followed by the Niagara of all crying sessions.
Our kids aren't total monsters! They're actually awesome little humans! How much of this goodness had I missed while lecturing about how we were late, and there wasn't time for playing, and mom has a meeting tonight, and we have to get dinner ready so we can get to bed and do it all again. And again. And again. Man, I missed so many hugs, so many chances to kiss ouchies, so many opportunities to ask questions just to get funny answers.
Now I get to treasure it. I keep a mental list all day of things that J would like to know, things that would make him laugh if he were next to me. Because, I'll be honest, sometimes by 5:30 they've converted back to something very monster-like some days and I'm not sure he'll believe me.
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