Heavy

We are a light family. We dance in the kitchen, wrestle with our kids in the living room and toss pillows and towels and blankets over our heads (or throw them at each other's heads) nine or ten times a day. We are lighthearted, my husband and I. And we try to pass this on to our kids, let them know that making a mistake is more bearable if you laugh it off, that (minor) boo-boo's can be fixed by shaking it out, or getting a quick peck from Mom or Dad. That sometimes you just need to dive off of the couch into a pile of pillows, and that's ok.

But kids are smarter than that, more intuitive. And despite our best efforts to not let them see the burden that we're carrying, they do. Even my little son, not yet three, knows that his mom and dad are struggling, he reads us better than we read ourselves.

Standing in store check-out line, I'm humming and holding The Boss to keep him from running amuck through the aisles of Christmas decorations. He pulls back from me and looks me squarely in the eye. "It'll be ok, Momma," he tells me. And though I'd been masking my worries through humming and smiling and pointing out the big Santa decorations and the plastic snow globes that inflate on your lawn and spew Styrofoam snowflakes - he hasn't been fooled.

While I worked recently, my husband was playing with our son. Some quiet game, not their typical wrestling match, something peaceful before bed. And my son came to my husband, looked at him seriously and told him gently, matter-of-factly, "Love can heal that boo-boo, Daddy."

I saw the woman who fired my husband last night.

The hotel I work at is practically in the same parking lot as hers (and they're currently at war, nothing to do with what happened with my husband). She came through the lobby door, pulling her gloves on her hands, too distracted to notice who was behind the desk. When she looked up and met my eyes, her face turned red, turned raspberry, maroon even. She stumbled over herself, almost turned back around to leave. My presence had caught her off guard - the friend she was coming to see wasn't at the desk, and in her place was the woman working 40+ hours a week to keep her family afloat in the wake of what she did to her husband, her family.

My kids haven't had their annual doctors appointments, we don't have insurance.

I smiled at her politely, treated her with the same warmth and welcome as I do any of the guests who walk through our door.

And when she left, I smiled and waved and would've sent her off with a pleasant "have a good night..." had I not been on the telephone with a guest.

I felt a burden lifted. I am not bitter. She may have disrupted my life, but she has not disrupted my heart.

We are a light hearted family. We dance in the kitchen and laugh off our mistakes and let love heal what we can not.