Family Rhythm

All the children were in their places when I set the casserole down on the table.  I slid into my spot and sighed.  "It feels so good to be back."  Jason lit the candles and we all bowed our heads.

This past week has been full of surprises for us.  When I left the house Wednesday night, I never dreamed I wouldn't see the other children until Saturday afternoon.  I hugged them goodbye and said "I'll be here in the morning."  It didn't turn out that way.

In the following days, I sat crib-side in the hospital room when Peter slept, thinking about how things were going at home and straining against the unnatural feeling of truly having nothing to do but wait.  Meanwhile, the children were passed from family member to family member, and, when Jason was home from work, he was making the best of a home with 4 anxious little ones and no partner to make dinner, or to brush hair, or help tuck them in bed at night.

We all just simply did the next thing - did the work that was in front of us.  It felt good to be able to respond in that way, for me to be exactly where I was needed with our littlest, and for Jason to be able to tend those at home. Still, coming home could not have been sweeter.  We all missed the rhythm of our family.

I'm not one for rigid scheduling, and so much of our days seems to have an effortless, unencumbered flow to it.  Even so, we do have those  sign posts of daily must-haves that we touch on each and every day.  One of those being family dinnertime, complete with lit candles.  Every night.  Its the gateway to a calm evening, the beginning of the end of day, the first in a series of activities that leads gently toward that moment when I tuck them in.  This past week hasn't seen much of that.  Hurried meals after Dad came home from work, movies watched for too long and bedtimes left unobserved.  A great upheaval to our "normal."

There's not much glamorous of this little life of ours.  Its pretty simple, all said.  Lots of children, laundry, dishes.  And yet there is so much that is precious to us in just our daily dance.

Later on, I brush the girls' hair and they pick out pajamas and a story.  "I'm so glad you're back," Dinah says, pulling my face close for a kiss.

Here in the gentle flow of our family rituals, I'm home again.