Estimated reading time: 2 minute(s)

After a frustrating morning (perhaps nearly entirely self-inflicted – at least, maybe it didn’t need to be as frustrating as it was) and a frustrating lunch, I reluctantly decided that I should take our two-year-old Julia on her OK Night. She’s been waiting for quite a while (I’ve been busy) and there’s an eager queue behind her, of course.

We gathered everything together for a walk. I had planned some fun things for her, but also was going to make efficient use of my time and make the post office our destination on the walk, so I could pick up my mail. Gotta multi-task, right?

Nope. And it took a beautiful little two year old to remind me of that.

As we embarked on our walk (under the windy, rainy, overcast skies) we were chatting. Julia is a wonderful talker. She has a lot to say, and mostly I know what she’s talking about. 🙂 As she was talking, she would just throw in a happy, sing-songy refrain of “OK Night” every once in a while. 🙂

She definitely began to melt my heart.

As we walked – not really all that far yet – I saw some flowers, and we crossed the road to go see them up close. She was very excited, and loved everything her Daddy suggested they do. At this point, she started helping me to enjoy the moment, and I cancelled all plans for multi-tasking on the trip and decided to just enjoy each moment of this short hour or so with my little Julia.

We ended up walking to a store to get some baseballs for the boys and to get a fun snack to eat at the park. Except, when we left the store, she said she wanted to see the water… so, we headed up to the Erie Canal marina not too far from that store. We sat on the bench eating iced animal crackers (she loved the pink ones!) and just had fun time looking at the water.

The rain brought us home, but we still enjoyed every moment along the way. Stopped to smell every flower. Listened to every word. Breathed every breath.

I am pretty sure that is all I need right now. For whatever reason, my work, and my life have become “pressure” to me. I have had a hard time recently just stopping to relax and enjoy. Julia knows how to do that well, and helped me to do that today. I thanked her for it when we got home as I laid her down for her nap. 🙂

There’s good reason for the pressure I think. The bills still need to be paid. The work still needs to be done. Raising kids is hard work. When will I ever get to enjoy a nice evening out with my wife again? (Without the attached baby?) 🙂

This too shall pass. But hopefully not too quickly. I’d like to enjoy the moments along the way.