Today was one of those days that was so beautiful in such a normal way. You know... you go through the day without thinking, then all of the sudden you look around you and realize, that while this day is completely normal right now, one day your life will change into something utterly different. You want to slow everything down, notice every detail, tattoo it on the back of your eyelids so you never forget it.
I lit my candle in the morning, and smiled when I saw the flowers one of my boys brought me the day before. And then another of my boys came in and told me "Good morning" in Spanish. We sang with the middle graders. I just put the song Love Amazing into our songbook. I know it's semi-weddingish but it's too good to only sing once in a while. The words and the music are perfect for each other, and this morning they just made me realize again how amazing God is. I sang it all day long.
We didn't have a lot of work, so the morning was relaxed. I told them random stories and facts... talked too much. I don't know what they think of me sometimes. Seventh grade studied about Bible measures in math... the bath is a unit of liquid measure, about six gallons to be exact. They used it to measure oil and such. In one Bible verse it admonished the merchants that they should have a "just bath." Cracked everyone up!
After lunch, I was quaking because I thought my art project was sort of lame. I found what I thought was a cool knot called the jug sling knot. It slips around the neck of a bottle so you can carry it around or hang it somewhere. So I bought Sparkling Ice drinks and thought we could use a bunch of paracord from another project. It seemed like a good idea last night, but by lunch time I had convinced myself it was a stupid idea. But they loved it! We practiced the knot awhile... getting our bunny ears and pretzels sorted out... I explain things in such random ways to them, and then it's kind of embarrassing to hear them talk about it using all my strange terminology!
We got done with the rest of our work at 1:45. We played softball with the middle grades for a bit, then they left us all alone with five people on a team... We are so out of practice, but there were so many good vibes today! Three awesome catches by a girl that's not that confident... she was in the perfect spot outfield, again and again. There were encouraging words to the pitcher instead of grumblings about how many people were being walked. The sky was so blue and the sun so bright. I was hitting in front of a boy that kept hitting beautiful home runs and chasing me around the bases. So I would sit on the grass, huffing and puffing, and watch everyone, and think about how much I knew about each one of them, and how I was going to let four of them go in just eight weeks. The tree that the boys always sit under had Sparkling Ice bottles hanging from the branches. Someone said it looked like a fruitful tree. And I was so thankful for each one of them, and how much they have added to my life.
After school, an awesome mom had brought along the bars she made for her kids' after school snack. Hot out of the oven... and she left some for us. I got out my cold brew pot and started some up again, and faintly in the distance, I hear kumbucha calling. I miraculously got out of school at 5:15, and I had taken my shoes off already. I stepped gingerly across the gravel... my feet so white and uncalloused after four months of moccasins. Looks like the misery of Missouri winter is over!