What a difference a day makes! The minute I was released from rating essays for the Test That Dare Not Speak Its Name, I collected my colleague, dashed to the car, and hit the highway for the five-hour drive home, with just one brief stop for gas and an even briefer detour to figure out how to get back to the turn I'd missed. I hoped to get home in time to see my adorable grandbaby, who was visiting my house with her parents, but we worked later than expected Sunday afternoon so she was already asleep by the time I got home.
But no one else was. In fact, my house was buzzing with activity; young people were sawing baseboards, painting a ceiling, installing new flooring. As a Mother-and-Father's Day gift for us, my kids fixed up the guest bathroom, transforming it from dreary to gleaming, with a new floor that doesn't look as if it's been mauled by wolverines.
They put the finishing touches on it this morning while I played "Let's Put Ridiculous Things On Our Head" with my granddaughter. I don't know what made me happier: the little one's laughter or the sound of my son and son-in-law working together to reinstall the toilet. What did I ever do to deserve such great kids?
I came home with fatigued eyes (reading, driving) and sore shoulders (hunching over essays, driving) and stiff hips (sitting all day long), but today I restored my tissues with a great hike in the woods followed by lunch and some serious loafing. One of these days I may start to feel like reading again, but today I've been feasting my eyes on things that look nothing like words: a new floor, a freshly painted ceiling, some trees, a creek, and a curly-topped kid with a colander on her head. What could be better than that?
2 comments:
Nothing is better than that. Not one thing.
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