Living Life Like a Kid

Today a long awaited rain finally came. It's been raining since mid afternoon—a wet, grey evening.

Tonight I had to come home from work a bit early at 5:00pm so that Julie could buzz off to a meeting. When she got back, I had to run out to a 7:00pm meeting of my own.

Once Julie left, Abbey and I sat down to a dinner of rice, bean and kale burritos (yes, we have a lot of kale and chard these days).

After a quiet dinner, I dropped on the couch and flicked on the TV to watch the six o'clock news. After five minutes of that, Abbey walked up to me and said, "noisy." I asked her if she wanted me to turn off the TV and she said yes.

I asked her if she wanted to listen to some music and she agreed. I turned on a local community radio station that was playing a little roots music. I asked her if she wanted it louder, to which she promptly said, "no!"

I asked, "Softer?"

She said, "Yes."

Then she said, "Softer...softer...softer..." until I had the volume turned all the way down. She smiled.

I flicked the radio off.

I asked her if she wanted to lie down and listen to the rain. She agreed. We curled up on the couch and listened to the rain, the passing cars, and the birds.

After ten minutes or so, she started to ask, "Mommy go?" I told her Mommy went to a meeting. She kept asking, and I kept answering. To break the monotony, I began to sing silly songs to her about Mommy going away and Mommy coming home. The songs, and the rain, soon had us drifting off to sleep.

Once again, Abigail reminded me how to live life to its fullest by enjoying simple pleasures like an unexpected nap on a rainy evening.