Joy in my Home Office

There is a sea of items on the desk.  They are piling on top of one another, vying for space and growing.  As I approach the desk to clean it there is a ball of anxiety that wells up, not for this small pile but for the redundancy of it, for the millions of small piles in my home, in my head. 

I see a handful of Lego dudes, a little plastic horse, little vehicles crafted by little hands.  Something in me stops, I don't WANT to pick them up.  I like looking at them. 

Normally when I have these sentimental pauses I push them to the side, shaking my head at my inability to just DO.  I routinely pick them up and discard them into small bins, big bins, a room of these bins so that I can create order out of the chaos of childhood. 

Today, however, I just stared at them.  I took a picture of them.  I cherished them.  What is this in me that wants to touch, treasure, LEGOS of all things?  After all, Legos are what I found in my two year old's mouth yesterday.  Legos are what I step on and curse.  They are the toy that refuses to be confined to its orderly bin.  

Somehow, perhaps for the music of JJ Heller waving through the house, or perhaps because the windows are open and Fall is here and I'm feeling something close to FREE; today I stopped and I just loved those little Legos. 

I love that Jonathan's fingers are still chubby and somewhat awkward as he puts them together, though he does it deftly and quickly, I can still see the rubber band wrist and the still-little fingernails as he works.  So rarely do I watch him do it, but I know how he looks when he does. 

There is a bubble of protective callousness in me that bursts when I see him helping William find pieces out of the bin and something so precious to me about Sam knowing what "guys" are, because at two he has already learned this boy term from his 

"budders". 

At some points in my life I would kick myself for not cherishing the small toys EVERY day.  I would respond to my tenderness with guilt, refusing to enjoy the joy of motherhood for all the hurts I have not comforted, all the toys I have literally thrown into bins as frustration and anger and exhaustion and confusion have tunneled themselves into hatred of those little plastic figurines. 

Not today.  Today I will love the joy, soak in it and work it into my head until bubbles of joy are forming.  Wash in it now, for tomorrow I will remember the sweet feeling of standing in the waterfall.