I left work on Wednesday with a million and one things on my mind.
On my way to pick up Graham at his babysitter’s I mentally itemized how I could spend the next several hours as efficiently as possible.
Pick up cat nip on the way home - Horace has a terrible addiction – then return a library book. At home strip Graham’s sheets and throw in wash. Play with him, offer a snack, return phone calls, pay bills on-line and prep dinner. Throw sheets in dryer. Hit the park for an hour.
Home. Late dinner, bath, stories and bed for Graham. Later dinner for Rob and I during which we would discuss child care for Graham while I am at BlogHer.
When did life get so busy, so regimented? I wondered.
When I arrived at the babysitter’s house and rushed to greet Graham, I caught my breath at the sight of his face. His eye, which had been slightly red that morning, was now turning purple and had swollen dramatically.
He was bright, chipper and not in pain so I wasn’t overly worried about his immediate health.
But there was no question of what would we do next.
We rushed home, collected his health card plus a book and a snack and headed back out in rush hour traffic to an after hours clinic where I knew we would wait God knows how long before Graham saw a doctor.
Simple.
No thoughts of bills or errands or plans.
No cat nip for Horace. No escaping library fines. No clean sheets or home-cooked dinner.
Just a surprising sense of peace and clarity, born, I suppose, of knowing, for once, exactly how to prioritize.
Funny how one little person can make things so complicated and yet so simple.
*We still don't know what happened to Graham's eye. The doctor thought an allergic reaction, Rob says a bug bite and I suspect he banged it on our coffee table while roughhousing with his dad the night before. At any rate it has improved dramatically since this picture was taken Wednesday night.*
