Blogging For a Cause

It seems there are just not enough hours in the day lately for me to even blog once a week. Life just keeps happening at warp speed. I do blog in my head sometimes..... trying to permanently etch into my memory, the sweetly innocent yet somehow deeply profound comment casually made by Peanut, or the image of Sissy, all arms and legs these days, sitting in assorted, ever-changing angles on her Daddy's lap. A kind-of internal radar goes off in me.... "Remember this", I say to myself. I focus as hard as I can on the details of these precious snapshots in time, and for a little while, I am seduced into believing I'll never forget them. But later when I call on them, the unforgettable moments become the vaporous, elusive details of a dream. What WAS it Peanut said that was so funny and perceptive last week? It was about people called "something"s and how they never "something" as the name would imply. I try in vain. The dissipation of a memory is in progress. In a couple of weeks it will be completely gone.

On a more positive note, I have managed to rescue several endangered memories since I started blogging. My first post, a little over a year ago, captured a small but priceless snippet of a day so uneventful and ordinary, my recollection of it would have faded long ago. But because I wrote about it, I remember it.

I'm reposting it here. It's my new inspiration.


May 9, 2007 -

Today we blew bubbles. The girls had new bubble blowing gizmos that were supposed to make Gigantic Mega Bubbles. Hmmmmm. We must have done something wrong. We had lots of bubbles, some fairly big, just not Gigantic Mega big. But I kept my cynical 'false advertising' rant to myself, and amazingly, the girls were having too much fun to notice that their bubbles did not live up to the promise on the package. Peanut and I sat down in the shade and played catch, blowing bubbles back and forth to each other and catching them with our wands. Or more often, not catching them, and watching them float away on the breeze. Sissy wasn't into it as long, but she hung around with us anyway. It was one of those wonderful 80 degree days in May when you could just stay outside all day. This is the kind of thing I want the girls to remember when they're grown. If I can just not lose sight of that, this summer will be a good one.

And like an unexpected gift, I realize that these words cause me to remember details I didn't even write about. We're not just blowing bubbles. Peanut and I are sitting on the still-soft grass of spring, in the backyard under the silver maple tree. Sissy plays on the swing that hangs from the same tree. The air feels like pure oxygen. It's just that kind of day. Three souls in the world are simultaneously, if temporarily, content.

To remember that afternoon is to retreat to a peaceful haven .

And that is all the reason I need to keep blogging.