Uninvited

Today, like most days, I was all over the place and at highway speed; busy with work, trying to figure out how to keep Wendy the Truck from breaking down (the nice man at the Oil Can Henry's found an entire gear's worth of metal shavings on the transmission drain plug...that's an expensive sort of surprise...) and what to do if she does, how to prevent the sugar ants from coming back, what to do next to clean and cook and laundry for two hungry, messy little peeps, in the midst of reading this and that (about which I want to post a bit later), frustrated and distantly angry over our miserable excuse for a President and his arrogant, insolvent budget, thinking about everything but my own life: rain and kindergarten and leak tests and where to get Lily the cat some flea powder...

When without warning, I get home early and have a warm shower, get the laundry in and find a new book I've been anticipating in the mail...get to read the first chapter in the kitchen with the smell of baking salmon and saffron rice...Mojo and the kids pile in laughing and excited, playing with the box of toys Grandma Gruthie sent. Everyone tucks into the salmon and rice and salad, plays with the silly punching clown and hide-and-seek in the bedroom before all splashing into the tub, where Peeper and Missy play happily together like little seals, kicking and rolling. Missy snuggles warm and sweet in my arms as we rock before bed, pointing drowsily towards Nitty and pronouncing her "Kee-ka" in her sleepy baby voice. And finally the house goes quiet, with just Mojo reading in bed and Nitty curled beside the keyboard down here, still, content, readying for sleep.

Sometimes I forget, in the hurrying, turning world, in the stress and stretch of work and bills and children squabbling, these moments of uninvited happiness so bright and intense that I feel transfixed like Saint Teresa pierced by the dart. They don't come often, or surely, or on demand. But when they bubble up, satori-like, they lift me above the rush and business of my rainy day to a high, clear bright place where I can feel love vibrating within me like the skin of a drum.