Having a Moment

So, we left Corpus Christi and drove home to Austin today. My MIL cried when we left because, you know, we're really leaving. Leaving this state. Leaving this...everything.

I felt terrible.

So, then we drove home and it was just about like any trip where we're cooped up in the car for four hours, plus stops. The kids got cranky. I got very tired and at one point, when I was driving, I almost ran off the road.

Which sort of stopped my heart and aged me by 25 years. My husband took over driving and I tried not to think about how careless I'd been with the lives of those who mean more to me than my own life.

When we got home, there were some people who wanted to see the house and so I rushed in, turned on all of the lights and then we loaded up the dogs and went to our neighborhood school to play on the playground for an hour. It looks like those people might make an offer on our house, though. (PRAY.)

And then we came home and struggled through dinner and television time and all of the noise that accompanies coming home from a trip. We unpacked and I did the laundry to get ready for the week. My husband flies out tomorrow at some ungodly hour and will be gone all week.

I'm dead tired. Seriously, bone weary.

There was screaming when we turned off the kids' show in the middle of it, despite the fact that we'd warned them and blah, blah, blah. We got out of patience and crabby and finally, just tried to slog through the whole thing.

After a little bit, Jane came down to see what the score was in the Super Bowl. And I heard my husband, who had needed to raise his voice to her five minutes earlier, say, "Aw, come here, little Buddy. You know something? I love you very much."

And there it was, see. That thing that redeems all of the mistakes and the arguing and the chaos and the stress.

Love. Just that simple thing.

I am possibly the most blessed woman on this planet. And sometimes I even know it.