Following our second night of vacation bible school for this week I was wiped out. Once we arrived home shortly after 9 pm, I charged the kids with watering the flowers immediately after stepping foot out of the the car. It was getting dark and this task is not easily done past dusk. We were pushing it as it was.
My goal was to have everybody in bed without any fuss or conflict. My youngest did not cooperate. Little things kept getting him down or distracting him from his instructions. I gave him my sternest "Just get her done" lecture, all the while trying my best to practice patience with him as I was very tired and I knew that he was too.
In addition to a myriad of other ailments mentioned, he yelled down to me from the hallway outside his bathroom that he got glass in his foot. I took a deep breath, arose from my chair in the kitchen, and trudged upstairs. As much as I wanted to ignore his plea as an exaggeration, I was reminded to show love to him in spite of how I was feeling. Showing me the spot where it hurt, he asked if I could feel the glass. I told him that I couldn't. I'm thinking it was just something a crumb or something that he had stepped on. I circumvented the problem by directing him to brush his teeth in my bathroom.
Tucking the boys into bed, my youngest prayed for two women in our church as he has been doing consistently. My heart softened as I was reminded of this other side of his temperament--concerned for other people and sensitive to their needs. After praying, he came down the ladder from his bunk to give the baby in my belly a kiss. My heart melted.
Back downstairs in the kitchen I began working on prepping to make banana bread for breakfast the next day. I hear the familiar creak of the steps letting me know that someone is coming down from their bedroom. It is my youngest son letting me know that he can now show me where to feel for the piece of glass in his foot. Ugh! I thought we were done with this. Deep breath again. I patiently ask him to sit in a chair so that he can prop his foot up on the table. He feels the spot for himself and then directs me where to feel. Sure enough I feel and see a small shard barely breaking his skin. I grab a pair of tweezers and work on dislodging the sliver while he sits bravely wincing at the pain. Finally, I get it out and present to him the source of his misery.
A grin fills his face from ear to ear as he gives me a big bear hug. "Thank you, Mommy. I love you," he says with the gratitude of one whose life has been saved. Thank you, God, for giving me yet another reason to be excited about being a mommy all over again.
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