I Don't See What Anyone Can See, In Anyone Else

Today I am thankful for all the usual things: a wonderful family, a strong and loving husband, healthy, intelligent, thriving children. I have a roof over my head and plenty of food to eat. It seems to me that even on a bad day that's way more than enough.

You could say I'm blessed, though I've never liked that turn of phrase. In my mind, to say that I'm blessed sounds pretentious and overinflated. It sounds as if I think I deserve my good fortune, when in truth I am rather humbled by it. When I take stock of my life, I feel a little like Maria in The Sound of Music when she realizes the captain is in love with her.

"For here you are, standing there, loving me
Whether or not you should
So somewhere in my youth or childhood
I must have done something good"

My boys, my three gorgeous boys--how did I get so lucky? Think about it: three times I have been pregnant, and three times it has ended in the birth of a perfect, healthy little boy I get to call my own. The sheer number of things that could go wrong in that process is mind-boggling. To say I have been blessed doesn't even begin to cover it.

And my husband. He works two jobs so that I can stay home with my boys. He is a wonderful father to my children, a kick-ass grill master, a witty conversationalist, and most importantly he loves us all. The man loves to come home at night and be with all of us. He loves family dinners and taking his boys camping. When I think of other people I might have married, I'm happy that things worked out the way they did.  I am lucky. You might say I am blessed. I am definitely humbled.

Those are the usual things, the husband, the kids, the house. But then, there are the other things to be thankful for: like the way Gus spells "broccoli" and "blueberries" phonetically: "brocclee", "bloobrees." There's the way Will and I have a little script at bedtime, when he hugs me really hard says, "Hug! Squish! What did I forget? Oh yeah! CRUSH!" There's the way the baby touches my nose while he's nursing, and his hands are always so warm. There's the way  all the boys pile in our bed every morning, too early, all looking for the warmest place. 

There's Dashing Husband wrestling with the Gus and Will, and Superbaby crawling over to be picked up. There's the pancakes and bacon for breakfast, the herd of boys running in and out and making the screen door slam, the sunlight on the baby's curls, the way the older two tell nonsensical knock-knock jokes to each other and laugh anyway. There is the comfortable sameness of these days, the knowing that the boys need me but won't forever.

I must have done something good.

Comments

[Kryste]

Oh Marcy, you put that into words perfectly.

[Amber]

Beautifully said. :)