GOOFY!!! Just do it!!!

Ok, so this whole "living" deal....it's kinda complicated! Not living as in breathing, but living as opposed to existing... they just aren't the same thing, at all. Ryan and I, we definitely just get by on existing...it's almost always that way. I don't think that is exclusive to just us, I think it's kind of an inherited thing among adults. Between work and home life and family duties and bills and all the other stuff we can't wait to grow up and take on, the capacity to just live diminishes almost into non-existence.

Children, on the other hand, are experts at this. They see magic everywhere...they believe in miracles without hesitation...they know only living. Pick the flowers, watch the ants, count the clouds, play in the tree, lay in the grass, dig a hole, eat outside in the sunshine, play outside in the rain.... all kids know and do is feel and love and laugh and live. That is their inheritance.

We have been blessed with five little loves who live every moment to the fullest and loudest. Impossible around here not to see that. We have also been blessed with a heads-up that life doesn't linger. So I've taken those blessings and pondered them and decided something great has to be done with them. Not to say we won't still spend many more days merely existing, slogging through the humdrum of adulthood as though we actually do have forever to get it right. But I've got my heart set on delving deeper into the way my children's view of the world leads them to live. Really truly live--experiencing and appreciating and feeling, and definitely laughing.

I kicked this experiment off yesterday afternoon, in no big fashion at all. We were at the school after hours for girl-scouts meetings for all three of my girlies, and we had to go back and forth between the primary and the intermediate sides of the building. So walking along, in the empty hallways, through the dark gym, I triple-dog-dared them all to run. They looked at me like I was nuts, and I explained the logistics of a triple-dog-dare and how you can't not do it. So on the count of three we all took off running like maniacs through the school!! :D :D :D And while part of me hopes to goodness there are no cameras to have caught us on, the biggest part of me just wants to see those three grinning, bouncing faces in my mind forever!

If there is one thing I can encourage y'all in---let it be to go out and be goofy. There is SO much living in that alone!!! Just do it, and then tell me all about it!!!!! <3