Simple Beauty
There’s so much out there that can drive you down.
News about shootings, unhinged tweets screaming about how unfair you’re being tweeted by investigators, volcano news, racist rants.
All things that have made me shake my head, and wonder about the life that will be left for my kids.
But you have to let the beauty in.
It’s fleeting.
Sometimes it’s hard to spot.
“Dad, did you see this?”
Just my 20-year old son showing me that J.J. Watts is going to pay for the funerals for the Santa Fe victims.
I’d seen it. I watched it over again with him.
The dog jumps up on the couch.
Just wants me to pat her head.
Simple enough.
“What sauce you want me to go with this weekend?”
“Red.”
I cut up the onions and add the garlic, thinking of my Dad doing it, every week, for a lot of years.
We eat. Together. Sam and Jake trying to guess the batting averages of random MLB players, laughing and teasing one another as they turn it into a competition.
That’s easy stuff, but just what is needed to drive away the nastiness that waits for them just out the door.
“Can I use the car?” Jake asks.
I think of him as less than two years old, waking up early so he can watch the garbage men empty the garbage. His body shook with joy when I took him out to meet those guys (who thought we were insane).
Beautiful memories.
Free to recall.
I look out at the backyard where the grass is freshly cut, and everything looks clean and fresh.
It was a yard that didn’t look like it does now.
The grass didn’t grow in some places. There were pine trees and pine cones everywhere. The place was a mess.
I fixed it all up, on legs that worked a lot better than they do now.
A yard where kids played on swings, where we played kickball, and practiced swings. Max, Shadow and Melky and Paris...roaming every corner.
Watched a movie on Saturday about young kids, drinking beer, finding love.
“You miss being young?” I asked Kathy.
“We had our time,” she said.
There’s a lot of garbage...
...it’s impossible to keep it all out.
But it’s the simple beauty of life that makes it bearable.
Pay attention to it.
News about shootings, unhinged tweets screaming about how unfair you’re being tweeted by investigators, volcano news, racist rants.
All things that have made me shake my head, and wonder about the life that will be left for my kids.
But you have to let the beauty in.
It’s fleeting.
Sometimes it’s hard to spot.
“Dad, did you see this?”
Just my 20-year old son showing me that J.J. Watts is going to pay for the funerals for the Santa Fe victims.
I’d seen it. I watched it over again with him.
The dog jumps up on the couch.
Just wants me to pat her head.
Simple enough.
“What sauce you want me to go with this weekend?”
“Red.”
I cut up the onions and add the garlic, thinking of my Dad doing it, every week, for a lot of years.
We eat. Together. Sam and Jake trying to guess the batting averages of random MLB players, laughing and teasing one another as they turn it into a competition.
That’s easy stuff, but just what is needed to drive away the nastiness that waits for them just out the door.
“Can I use the car?” Jake asks.
I think of him as less than two years old, waking up early so he can watch the garbage men empty the garbage. His body shook with joy when I took him out to meet those guys (who thought we were insane).
Beautiful memories.
Free to recall.
I look out at the backyard where the grass is freshly cut, and everything looks clean and fresh.
It was a yard that didn’t look like it does now.
The grass didn’t grow in some places. There were pine trees and pine cones everywhere. The place was a mess.
I fixed it all up, on legs that worked a lot better than they do now.
A yard where kids played on swings, where we played kickball, and practiced swings. Max, Shadow and Melky and Paris...roaming every corner.
Watched a movie on Saturday about young kids, drinking beer, finding love.
“You miss being young?” I asked Kathy.
“We had our time,” she said.
There’s a lot of garbage...
...it’s impossible to keep it all out.
But it’s the simple beauty of life that makes it bearable.
Pay attention to it.
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