better

things have been much lighter since my last posting. i guess i just really needed to cry, you know how that goes.
yesterday, we had a beutiful, warm spring day. we hung out with sena's friend, giovanna, in the morning, and with my sister and julia. went for a weet little walk around roxi's neighborhood. giovanna's dad picked her up at our house at 2:30, and it was so beautiful out that sena, aiyana and i just ended up spending a few more hours outside. first, we played in the mud. the front of our house is a mud pit at this time, and getting in and out of the house can be frustrating. usually, what happens is that it takes an hour for me to get everyone ready to leave the house, and then when we're finally outside, just about to get in the car, one of the kids trips and falls flat in the mud. so then, i have to go back in the house, get a change of clothes, etc. etc, and in the meantime we're late to whatever we have to do, one or both kids are crying, i'm frustrated, etc.

yesterday, as we hung out near the house, i started getting nervous seeing sena and aiyana near the mud pit. they really wanted to play in there, had their digging sticks ready and their rubber boots on. i felt myself getting tense as i was just about to say "stay out of the mud", and then i just said to myself, why not, why not let them enjoy themselves? so i did, i said, go ahead, and that's all it took, before they were both running back and forth through the thickest of it all, falling in the puddles, stomping and splashing everythere. it was so much fun to let it take whatever shape it would, to not try to control it. i wish i could let it go like this more often, but unfortunately they do need a lot of washing and cleaning afetrwards, not bc i care what they look like, but bc they don't like to be wet, and this is just not practical sometimes.

so anyway, after all that fun in the mud, i washed them both (outside, bucket style), changed them, and we headed to the general store for some soup. we sat outside on a bench, in the sun, and it was so much fun hanging out and relaxing (yes, relaxing, i guess the mud play wore them out..). just the three of us. i felt really good doing that.

sena's been coming up with these really sweet things lately. a while ago, for example, she asked if we were going to die, and i said that everyone will die at some point. then she got really serious, and almost scared, and she said, "but i don't want you and dada to die". then she told us that we had to eat a lot and get lots of energy, so that we would not die. i told her that most likely it will be quite some time before we die, and that we'll get to spend lots of time together before that happened. but she still insisted that we could not die.
that was a month ago or so. then, this morning, she told me that she knew that ed and i would die at some time. but she wasn't sad sying this. that's bc, she said, we would all die together. we'd all snuggle up together, and be really close, and die that way. it was just so sweet, it really touched me.

every day, there are so many precious moments... i want so much to be open, to be receptive to them. i want to let any heaviness i may be experiencing be there, acknowledge it - but i don't want to let it control me and rob me of these unique moments. they happen so quietly, so unexpectedly, that unless i'm open, i miss them completely. they are so small, and yet when i'm receptive, they fill me with joy, and lighten whatever is weighing me down.

peace