Little Moments

We are at my parents house for a long weekend visit. I tell you, I relax the minute I hit my hometown city limits. I know that ahead of me stretches a time of catching up, of letting the children roam about in the new familiarity of Memum and Pepop's place, gatherings in my Dad's garage next to a wood furnace, perhaps even a few moments in the hot tub. I let my guard down and look forward to a time of softer rules for the kids.

Mom and I went to The Big Box Store after the kids went to bed last night. It's a great time of day to go, after bedtime on a school night. So much less crowded. We meandered around and took our time. We finally headed back to the house.

Our return found Thomas and Sarah Grace both piled in bed with my Dad, Thomas whimpering over something that had scared him and Dad and Sarah Grace sleeping through it. And then Sarah Grace woke up. It took a few moments to get both kids calmed down. I hadn't told them I was leaving, and they were both a tad discombobulated over Memum's and my absence.

Once they were soothed, they both declared they needed to sleep with me. We decided that Sarah Grace would sleep in the bed with me and Thomas would sleep on a pallet on the floor. I got them settled in and went to the bathroom to ready myself for bed.

It was a smidge after 11 PM.

When I re-entered the room, it was to laughter. Thomas, my reading child, had noticed the letters that had been carefully placed on the foot-board of the bed many years ago. Letters that spelled out a phrase that I am certain my Dad and his brothers heard often throughout their childhood. Letters that nobody had ever removed. Letters that have brought about many smiles over the years as we imagine my freckle-faced Dad as a youth carefully placing, probably while he had been banished to his room for not adhering to the simple instruction of the phrase.

'B Good'

In silver lettering. The bed stood in my Great Grandfather's house for all of my memory. As a teenager, I cleaned his home every week. It never once occurred to me to peel those letters off. The wisdom of the women before me had deemed it appropriate that the bed stay as it was, in it's slightly marred state. And so it moved to my parents home, graffiti and all.

And now my children had discovered it. In their slightly loopy state, they got a massive case of the giggles as they quietly chanted 'The bed said B Good. The bed said B Good!'

I crawled into the bed and let them giggle for a moment or two longer, then shushed them. Their silence lasted nearly two whole seconds before the uncontrollable giggles came bursting forth again. And I felt those giggles bubbling up inside me. I couldn't help it... the kids merriment was contagious!

We laughed for longer than was strictly necessary. And then we laughed some more. Each time we would calm down, somebody would start up again.

I drank in the moment, knowing that I normally wouldn't have allowed it to drag on as long as it was, and mentally kicked myself for being too busy to take time to get the giggles with my kids more often.

And, I was grateful for the decision made 40 years ago to leave those silly letters on the bed stead.