REMEMBER THIS

I got up this morning all uptight. The sink is full of dishes and the dishwasher needs emptying. Our Christmas tree is sagging and when in the world will I have time to take it down? The kitchen floor is sticky and there’s dog hair everywhere and laundry piled up and I haven’t exercised in who knows how long.

Of course I’m tense... this day holds too much too do already.

Yet downstairs in the guest room my daughter sleeps. Curled up next to her husband is the girl I hardly ever get to see. Today I’ll bask in that smile and feel that sparkle and hear those words.

For just a few more hours she’ll be here with me in my home, a part of my life.

So why am I worried about laundry?

And up the stairs are two little grandboys, sleeping away. In just a moment or two they’ll wake up so excited to be at Amma and Pop’s house. Fresh with joy and full of affection, they’ll jostle for room on my lap. Jude will tell me all about his plans for the day while Moses interjects his ideas.

Legos will be built, tummies will growl for good grandma food, a book will get pulled out of the pile that must be read right now.

And after a while my son-on-break-from-college will roll out of bed all bleary eyed from staying up late. He’ll tell me what that pile of Bibles on the table is all about and what they talked about so late into the night and how they’re changing this world of theirs.

And I’m obsessed with dog hair?

I don’t know how I get it so wrong still. Or why I worry about things that don’t matter. And sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever learn…

That people are more important than all I have to do.

That moments like these can’t be brought back.

That memories are made in the midst of messes. And that no one remembers the messes anyway.

That all those messes are worth the memories of these moments.

And that all I really have to do today is relish the people I love.

From the heart of a woman who’s learning…

Diane