...Like a Child

I read someting the other day that sort of got my attention and made me really think..."Look at small children gleefully at play; do we know something they don't know, or do they perhaps know something we've forgotten?"

...last night at work I shared this with my boss as the kids were all but totally out of control. And we laughed a little. (ok, A LOT!) It is so true!!!

We all remember what it was like being a kid. Carefree...oblivious to much...worrying about nothing other than simply having fun. Loving life and loving people...

And then?

When I was a little girl...imagination was everything! When I grew up I was going to be a stay at home mom...with about four kids, married to "Bo Duke"...then it was Sean Astin, followed by Christian Slater, and the last "unrealistic" husband I can remember was Jon Knight. I was going to be the wife of a "New Kid on the Block"! Oh the places I'd go in my own little world. Life was good...life was simple...and life was anything that I could "create" it to be.

As I entered the 6th grade, I realized that I wasn't Cinderella, there was no knight in shining armor that was coming to my "rescue"...and that the world in which we lived in well, could be down right mean at times. I was called names, laughed at and sometimes even ridiculed for my so-called "imagination", not to mention my "physique". However, I was blessed to have a 6th-grader named Jennifer step up to my defense. And after I kicked her tail in an arm-wrestling championship, we became best friends. And we've been best friends ever since!

As a child, we don't have to worry about finances, true love, employment, or parenting. Holding ourselves accountable for making the "right" decisions and having to suffer consequences when we make the wrong ones. As a child, relationships were easy...our hearts were pure...and cynicism and doubt simply didn't exist...(not as far as we knew anyway.)

I miss those days, when all I had to worry about was whether or not I would get into trouble if I called my brother a name or if he gave me a black eye.

And now...I worry about whether or not I'm successful at being a mom. How I can pay my bills and sit comfortably. Will I ever find someone I can love, be loved in return and share the rest of my life with or am I destined to be single for the rest of my life? I think about those things every now and again...but on days like yesterday, God smacks me upside the head and gives me a taste of what I should be thinking about. Observing those kids, loving on each other, being obnoxious as all "get out" and loving life.

And I realized...there's nothing wrong with letting them get crazy. They're going to have to face this "other world" sooner than they should have to.

..."do they perhaps know something we've forgotten?" Absolutely. And I think that sometimes we all owe it to ourselves to take a moment and remember.

but Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me. Don't stop them, because the kingdom of heaven belongs to people who are like these children." Matthew 19:14

(and now I just want to end with some pretty cool shots that I took this week...)