Remember Today (To my children)

It was a school day today and we went along with our routine.   We had breakfast on the patio that serves as our dining room and watched a couple of industrious bananaquits working at building a nest with some strings from a rag mop. After about 5 strings, I think the noise of our conversations and your baby sister's squeals convinced them to move to a quieter neighborhood. 

We got through school in good time but the swim teacher cancelled, so a little seam opened up in our day.  When Bible study was cancelled for the evening, the only thing holding us back was soccer practice.  So we ditched.  Maybe it's not such a bad example for you, really, because sometimes for sanity's sake that's exactly the cure for the boxes we build around our days. 

Once all of you were ready and slippery with sunblock, we piled in our Toyota Noah van and set out for the beach.  The sky was somewhat cloudy though none were particularly dark and I prayed that the rain would hold off for us.  Of course on a weekday afternoon, there weren't many people at the beach near Carlisle Bay. To the west the sea was like a hammered sheet of silver and to the east, it was a rainbow of blues.  The boats of all descriptions from cruise ships to yachts, from tankers to fishing boats, were bobbing in the middle distance.

I ordered fruit punches for you kids and a Bentley for me and by the time I got a drink, you were all screaming and playing in the surf.  It seems you'd made up a game where you could only be in the water  for 10 seconds before you froze and had to be tagged by a sibling who came at a run to rescue you and avoid the same fate.  Even the baby was laughing and playing although she had no clue what 10 seconds were and was just running in and out of the waves, dashing by you big kids and giggling madly. 

Miraculously, there were no squabbles unless you count the time when the baby stepped on the castle of a certain tempermental 6 year old architect. I watched you laughing, tagging and playing.  I wanted to swim at least a little so I convinced the baby to let me put on her floatie suit and come with me into the water.  It was cold at first although no doubt my ability to detect real cold is long gone. But the sun burst out from it's cloudy hide and seek game and warmed us up.  Once in the water, the baby chased leaves that had fallen from a nearby almond tree, little legs kicking like mad.  Big brother gave little sister a piggyback ride and pretended to be the sea horse for her mermaid  while the young architect took advantage of the quiet and rebuilt his masterpiece. 

We got ice cream on a stick, which we almost never do.  It's so expensive here.  I let you each pick out your choice and we sat down at the green picnic table with peeling paint and devoured our treats.  You brothers had white chocolate and little sister got caramel but baby sister ate up most of the mint chocolate that I had chosen.  I loved watching all of you grinning with ice cream dripping from your chins and ringing your mouths.  Somehow the baby got some on her elbow and my shoulder but a dip in the sea took care of that.

After a while, the clouds gathered again and it looked like another tropical deluge was coming.  As I walked back down to the sea to round you up for showers, I saw the winding trails of your footprints weaving in a crazy dance pattern that Arthur Murray could never have dreamed, and I laughed at the toeprints of our ballerina baby who loves so to run on tiptoes.  The rain came as we  turned toward the showers and we made a break for it, laughing all the way. 

Remember today--that much of it anyway.  It was deep lungful of life that reminds me that I don't have to live in gasps.