Saturday, April 19, 2008

Three minutes

I love writing schedules; I love complex feats of timing; I love hearing the clock in the background with that gentle "chick" that says when each second has passed.

I love time.

I wish it loved me back.

The other day I realized, a bit late, that I had only three minutes to get to my daughter's school to pick her up. Of course, I could fly out the door and probably get there on time, but I looked at my sorry self and realized that I needed a shower. Hum. Three minutes. Just how quickly could I shower? And get to the school not dripping, fully clothed, and more presentable than I currently was?

I decided to give it a try. I showered, dressed, dried my hair (mostly), made myself presentable and got there on time. What a rush of self-satisfaction.

Unfortunately, all this did was make me want to do this deadline crunch every day. As if I needed yet another excuse to push the limits.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

93

Jee and I walked to the library for our Monday library trip and as we left the front porch, I got a phone call, a long phone call. As we walked, I talked and Jake was his wonderful, patient self walking alongside me, noticing the world and walking in his jagged little "Ooo, what's that?" walk.

When I ended the phone call about nine blocks later, I heard him saying, "91, 92, 93..." I asked what he was doing.

"Counting litter. There are so many people who just let litter leave their hands. They shouldn't drop it. 94. They should keep it... 95... in their hands until... 96... they get to a garbage can..."

His little pro-cleanliness talk rambled on for the last four blocks to the library. What an awesome little guy. He loves seeing the world take shape through numbers and other graspable concepts.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Little legs

Today goes down in history as being the Day of Nirvana for me.

I went on my first run with my daughter. Up until tonight, I hadn't considered this as a possiblity. I never visualized what it might be like to see my daughter love running like I did / do.

We went to the park after dinner, dug in the sand for a few minutes then my legs got itchy. This time of night I usually get itchy legs, but tonight I had two little kids in tow, not really a time to stretch my legs.

Nevertheless, just for fun I started jogging around the park in tight little circles on the path that wound around the sandbox. I felt very much like a caged cat. Less than a minute later, Aee popped up, asking for a race. "Come on mamma!" She took off without waiting for a reply. Her little legs pumped ahead of me and I found I had a hard time keeping up.

Nirvana!

My heart sang as I saw that she now has both speed and grace. She always had an intuitive grace, but the speed was something new.

There's this little thing that we have always done before we race. We put our feet in the start position, one foot placed in the lead, straight ahead, and arms at the ready. We do a little Rocky-style punch-punch-punch to get the arms loosened up, ready to help the body propel itself properly. Seeing Aee do the little punch-punch-punch then take off like a bolt of princess-powered lightning, wow.

My heart be still.