I do believe that the whole of the human emotional potential can be experienced during one Catholic Mass attended with two toddlers.
There’s worship and praise, tears and desperation, joy and giddiness. And all of that is sometimes before the readings even start.
Today Mae was a mama’s girl. She knows what’s going on. If she wants to have fun and perhaps cause a little mischief during Mass, she goes to Daddy. If she’s tired and wants some cuddling, she comes to me.
Well about halfway through, she decided she wanted to lay in my arms, so she fell to the side like a little baby does, and she laid in my arms for about ten minutes. Her other little arm was draped over my shoulder, and she laid there peacefully, looking into my eyes as hers started to get droopy.
And I realized… this is life. This is what it is all about.
We question and we wonder and we ponder and we analyze. We struggle to make our way. We struggle to find our peace. We struggle to understand it all.
But here is the answer. Sitting peacefully in the middle of my family, thanking God for all that He is and all that He has done for us while sitting smack dab in the middle of his greatest gifts to me.
We don’t need the answers to it all. We don’t need to understand everything that is happening, and we don’t need to constantly be seeking out the whys. Sometimes it is okay to just be and to just bask in the overwhelming gifts we have all received.
The next moment will come. The stresses are around the corner, the fatigue will set in, the worry will start to creep on by. They all have their time and their place. They aren’t going anywhere. To focus on them is easy. To let them overtake us is even easier. But to focus on the beautiful — that sometimes takes effort.
But when we can… when we can focus on what is truly timeless and exquisite and indisposable… that’s when the magic happens.