Dishes

Dishes are not my favorite.  However, we have four kids, and I enjoy cooking but hate a messy kitchen, so I do a lot of them.  Grudgingly.

In attempts to change my attitude, I have reminded myself of Brother Lawrence who worshipped God even in menial tasks.  And the whole bit about “whatever you do… do it as unto the Lord.”   A clip from the movie “Return to Me” will even run through my mind—the part when Grace’s grandfather tells her he is “blessed with work.”

I still loathe doing the dishes.   They just seem so overwhelming.  And infinite.

They didn’t bother me today.

You see, the back of my mind is haunted with these words, “Someone walked into a school and shot six-year-old babies.” 

I’m sorry if it seemed as though my last post was my way of wrapping it all up and moving on.  I promise I will write about other things another day, but for now I’m still stuck here.  So I write.

I have cried.  And cried some more.  And my heart is grieved.  And part of me feels like I don’t have the right to cry like that because my children are okay.

But I do not feel okay.

I taught those loveable, squirmy, sweet, enthusiastic, wide-eyed six and seven-year-olds.  Twice a week I now tutor them.  And two of my own are  first graders.  This all just hits so close to home.

The past two days I heard sirens drive past my house, and both days I wondered if they were going to my children’s school just down the road.  I sat next to my six-year-old in her school cafeteria today and felt like I couldn’t love her enough or drink in her first-grade ramblings deep enough for that half hour we shared.  When my third-grader jumped up to run out of the cafeteria to retrieve his forgotten jacket, I fought the feeling that he might not be safe going out that door.

I realize that school shootings do not happen every day.  But it did happen.  And sometimes in one way or another life is ripped away most prematurely and unexpectedly.

Today when I did the dishes, I felt so very grateful for the dishes of these children that I love so much.  One day these littles will no longer live in my house with their laughter and craziness and cuddles and mess, and that day may come sooner than I wish.