On the ride to the park this evening I turned to Vinnie, who will be starting his new job on Tuesday, and said "Last day tomorrow."
Before he could respond, Alex chirped from the far back of our van "Excuse me, Mama, is tomorrow the last day?"
Slightly confused, I started to explain that indeed tomorrow will be Vinnie's last day at his current job, but Alex seemed not to hear me and continued on his own - "Is tomorrow the last day and we'll all go to see God and Jesus?"
From the mouths of babes.
My children always think in this sort of way - grand, eternal, forever is always on the horizon, life unfurls before them and they charge at it with urgency. They aren't cluttered by the things that concern us: clocks, cell phones, putting meals on the table, getting bills in the mail. For them, clocks are only useful if it's Christmas Eve and they're counting the minutes - cell phones are always for talking to Grandma - food is a gift from the grocery store and cooking it is a melody of spoons banging on pans as things boils on the stove - and the mailbox is always magic. Glorious strips of unsolicited address labels, March of Dimes envelopes with nickles glued just beneath rectangles of plastic, letters from Sunday School teachers or a Highlights Magazine, all left by sheer serendipity.
And so when Alex asked us if tomorrow is the last day, Vinnie and I first had to stop ourselves from dismissing him so easily. We had to unplug ourselves from our own tangled net of obligations and distractions, in order to step back and see the world as it is. A time line unknown in a world of choice and consequence, a place of hope just around the corner and in the present moment, if we'll only stop long enough to grasp it.
Before he could respond, Alex chirped from the far back of our van "Excuse me, Mama, is tomorrow the last day?"
Slightly confused, I started to explain that indeed tomorrow will be Vinnie's last day at his current job, but Alex seemed not to hear me and continued on his own - "Is tomorrow the last day and we'll all go to see God and Jesus?"
From the mouths of babes.
My children always think in this sort of way - grand, eternal, forever is always on the horizon, life unfurls before them and they charge at it with urgency. They aren't cluttered by the things that concern us: clocks, cell phones, putting meals on the table, getting bills in the mail. For them, clocks are only useful if it's Christmas Eve and they're counting the minutes - cell phones are always for talking to Grandma - food is a gift from the grocery store and cooking it is a melody of spoons banging on pans as things boils on the stove - and the mailbox is always magic. Glorious strips of unsolicited address labels, March of Dimes envelopes with nickles glued just beneath rectangles of plastic, letters from Sunday School teachers or a Highlights Magazine, all left by sheer serendipity.
And so when Alex asked us if tomorrow is the last day, Vinnie and I first had to stop ourselves from dismissing him so easily. We had to unplug ourselves from our own tangled net of obligations and distractions, in order to step back and see the world as it is. A time line unknown in a world of choice and consequence, a place of hope just around the corner and in the present moment, if we'll only stop long enough to grasp it.
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