A Precious Moment

I love kids.  I always have.  When I was a little girl in grade school we had to dress up for career day.  My friends dressed up as nurses, doctors, firefighters, dancers, astronauts, zookeepers—all kinds of exciting things.  But I didn’t want to be any of those.  I already knew what I wanted to be when I grew up: a wife and a mother.  I still want that.  It’s a life full of fun and excitement, challenges, passion, giving, and unconditional love, and I want it more than anything else in the world. 

Until I do get married and am a mother to my own children I’ve picked a career path that will have me surrounded by kids—I’m so excited for it!  I also have a few friends who are mothers so whenever I get to see them I get to be with their sons and daughters and I love that too.  Children warm my heart and I can’t imagine not having them in my life.  Since I’m around kids so often I’m sure I’ll have a few blog posts that describe my moments with them…and here’s my first.

Yesterday was Good Friday.  To honor the day my family and I do not have work, but instead of sleeping in that morning I went to school to meet with my Old English professor about my term paper.  As I walked into his office I looked around and grinned to myself.  Like my bookshelves at home his are also lined with toys—but his toys are knights in shining armor riding on horses.  You know you’re in good company when your professor keeps things like this in his office.  Anyway, as I was waiting for him to finish his phone conversation, I heard the clip-clop of little booted feet coming down the hall.  I peeked around the corner of one of the bookcases to see who was outside and it was one of my friends from class with her four-year-old son.  He is seriously the sweetest little boy I have ever spent time with—and he was wearing the red boots from his Halloween costume!  Of course that made me smile even more and I knelt down to give him a hug.  We all three talked outside in the hall until our professor finished his phone call then he ushered us inside. 

My friend told us that her son wanted to meet our professor and so, clutching his mom’s hand, he shyly introduced himself.  Our professor grinned and then introduced himself, asking: “Do you like to play with toys?”  The little boy nodded, “Yes.”  And our professor said, “Me too.  But you know what’s sad?  I really don’t have much time to play anymore because I’m so busy.”  He got up from his chair and picked up from the top of his bookcase one of the knights in shining armor.  “This is one of my favorite toys that I don’t have time to play with anymore.  I want you to play with it for me.  And you know what?  This knight doesn’t even have a name yet so you get to name him.”  Then he gave the toy to the boy, whose eyes were so full of pure wonder and happiness that it made my heart ache a little bit.  It was so sweet to see our professor connect with my friend’s son in this way and it seriously was the highlight of my whole day and one of the best moments of the semester.  Even now when I think about it I smile.

Children find pure happiness in the simplest of things and this is part of the reason why I love being around them so much.  Their precious happiness and delight is infectious and it warms my heart and makes me just as happy.  Really, what’s not to love?

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