::this moment::

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Some promised words.

(Today I'll give you some much promised words. 

Words I wrote this last fall and I guess they shouldn't just sit in my writing folder forever. 

So here it is...)

Her timing couldn’t have been worse, I had just turned the page in my book eager for the next plot twist, when she flung the car door open allowing the heavy, humid mid-August air inside, “Mom!  I REALLY have to go!”  She was dancing from foot to foot, eyes pleading with me to put the book down and take her to the bathroom.  With a deep, tormented sigh I slid my folded yellow post-it between the pages, willed patience into my tingling soul, and got out of the car. 

It had been a long day of tedious Mom stuff and I was seeking refuge in the air conditioned car, more than happy to watch my daughter slide down the grassy hill in her new light pink yoga pants, as long as I could squeeze in a few more pages of my book.  I must have gotten lost in the story, because I didn’t see her coming across the damp grass to the car. 

As I climbed out of the car, I could see a rain shower skirting south of us in the distance, making the sunshine overhead seem even more oppressive.  I closed the car door harder than necessary, grabbed her hand and started the hot walk to the high-school.  I kept my head down, trying hard to not be mad at her need to use the bathroom.

My steps were quick and aggressive.   My bubbling agitation was morphing into guilt when I felt a growing tightness around my hand.  Her fingers were gripping even tighter, steps slowing and she whispered a gentle sigh.  My eyes darted to her face, beaming with pure delight and radiant in the gentle shade of a nearby tree.  I lifted my head to see what had captured her, to find the most amazing rainbow.  Not just any rainbow, this rainbow looked solid like a preschooler’s heavy painting on damp construction paper, dripping with color, arching through the dark clouded sky.

I couldn’t move.  No sound came from my frozen mouth.  I was under its spell.  We stood, hands glued together by humidity and emotion, captivated by the beauty before us.  Too soon, the forces of bodily nature weakened the spell and we trotted off into antiseptic scented, blue-green tiled high school in search of a bathroom. 

            Our mission was soon accomplished and we ran pushing through the heavy high school doors into the sticky heat, seeking out our miracle in the sky.  To our delight it was still there, not as intense, but still a marvel of the natural world.  I felt her small hand sneak into mine and together we watched our rainbow fade into the landscape.

            I felt disoriented as we walked back to the car, my shoulders felt light, my head felt clear and I wasn’t annoyed by the sticky heat of her hand clasping mine.  We chatted animatedly about the wonder of rainbows and how they made us feel.  When we got back to the car the other children beckoned her away from me and I wasn’t eager to let her go.   Before she ran off she kissed me quick and there in her face I saw a rainbow of my own.  The whole spectrum of colors right there in front of me, my very own personal rainbow.  Sometimes bold and saturated, sometimes misty and translucent, and sometimes one color dominates the others, but always a rainbow.  Full of awe and wonder letting you know, this is pure love.   

Sky rainbows are magnificent and hard to ignore, but it’s the often overlooked small rainbows in our everyday lives that keep us going, allowing us to appreciate and reciprocate joy in the world around us.  They hide in the etched glass of my front door, they boldly jump out of a child’s coloring book, they dance in my husband’s face as he laughs with our son at the dinner table, and they sparkle in the mist of the garden hose as my kids escape the summer heat.  To be aware of them is pure delight, to expend too much energy searching them out can be tedious, and finding balance is a dance, a dance of your own making.

Rainbows and love are purely unique and personal experiences, no two people see them the same way.  Standing side by side with my daughter that day, her rainbow was not my rainbow.  Her blues might have shined a bit brighter or she could have felt joy in the transition of reds into oranges.   For me, that rainbow led me on the path back to myself, leaving the grumpy and self-centered Holly standing in the parking lot.

Hiding in my car that evening was only perpetuating the tangled frustration I had felt all day, what I needed was to slow down and allow my rainbow moment to happen.  People often over analyze the keys to finding love and happiness, the funny thing is if you were standing at “the end of the rainbow” you wouldn’t even know it.

:: this moment ::

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.