Sugared strawberries

August 8, 2015

Earlier this week, while walking through the backyard with my husband and younger son, I was struck by a rare flash of sentimentality.

I tend to be a spit/spot type of person, a git ‘er done type. I don’t spend a whole lot of time reflecting on any particular moment in time.

This is a good thing and a bad thing. It’s good because I tend to be highly efficient. I can accomplish a lot in a short period of time.

I’m what a boss would describe as a “hard worker” – that trait that is so prized in our American economy, and so potentially fatal to happiness.

It’s bad because a lot of great moments whiz past me without my notice. I have to make a conscious effort to deviate from my current mission to enjoy the scenery, to take things in.

I’m not particularly good at slowing down and breathing deep.

And so I surprised myself when I noticed, out of the blue, that my family and I were experiencing a fleeting, idyllic moment.

We were headed out to the garden to dump a worm from a bucket.

My son had caught the worm earlier that day while we were digging potatoes for dinner. He’d saved it to show daddy when he got home from work.

So there we were, walking across the expanse of our yard, green grass between toes, slight breeze, sunshine.

I carried the bucket with the worm. My son carried a cup of strawberries, sugared slightly to take a bit of sting out of their sour.

My husband opened the garden gate and I dumped the bucket. We all waved at the dirt and said, “Bye, bye worm!”

“Go find your family!” My son added.

We walked slowly back across the yard, my husband commenting on the state of the raspberry bushes.

It dawned on me that this moment was special. The sun. The breeze. The grass. The worm. The cup of strawberries.

The toddler with sticky fingers. The husband, relaxed and happy to be home from work.

And me.

There are those rare moments when everything just fits; those moments when the clock ticks suddenly slower.

They sneak in between the rush to work, the rush home, the rush to make dinner, throw in a load of laundry, scrub the counters, scrub the kids, fill up the car with gas, dig potatoes, pay the bills…

Those moments when, for an instant, nothing matters but right now, in this time and place.          

You hear a bird twittering outside the window, or watch a rainbow fade after a summer storm.

A toddler eats sugared strawberries out of a cup and the family bids adieu to a worm.

These moments come and go quickly.

If we’re not careful, we’ll miss them.

I usually do.

I wonder how many other such moments I’ve missed, rushing here and there, hustling the kids to the car, zooming out of the driveway, headed to the Next Big Thing, the next whatever, the next item on my To Do list.

Today I’m wishing for more sun-kissed gardens. More worms in buckets. More sugared strawberries.

This article first appeared in the Lewistown News-Argus and the Sidney (Mont.) Herald on August 8, 2015.