A Heart Filled with Stone

Sitting in the cool grass under a splendidly blue sky listening to the water trickle over the pebbles in the brook nearby, the boys laughing and exploring the grassy banks for water snakes and snails. I couldn’t soak it in fast enough as I was studying high up on the bank. Anxiously wanting to join them as they kept calling out, “Mom are you done yet? When can you come play?” My surroundings and their pleas got the better of me. Kicking off my sandals I climbed over the wood railing and tiptoed through the wildflowers down the slopping bank. Through the brook, across the smooth pebbles they waded in search of fantastic finds. Ah, to have children is to be young and alive.

Just a few moments earlier Isaac ran across the wood plank bridge gently tossing a rust orange colored stone at me. Tumbling across the sun filtered grass perfectly halting as it reaches my side he yells out while turning and running back across the wooden bridge, “ this will make you feel good inside!” It most certainly did. He brought a smile to my heart and laughter to my lips.

The rusty orange colored stone now proudly rests lovingly upon my kitchen window seal with the others. Yes, there are others, many others. In fact my window seal is beginning to look a lot like a sea wall or the foundation of a castle being built with tender love in each perfectly picked stone.

I adore my kitchen window as odd as that may seem. My kitchen window is the only window in the entire house that I can open and still have privacy. It frames a beautiful mature shade tree that provides a sea of green leaves that sway soothingly in the breeze. In the winter it provides shelter for a variety of little feathered friends, which brighten my soul to watch on a cold dreary winter’s day. I am fond of the tree as it brings me something with every season. As I am fond of the window as it shares things with me.

But, most of all, the window in my kitchen is a very personal very special very meaningful place for me as a mother. For this is were I stand day in and day out as my boys run in and out and all around me. This is where I stand with aching feet and tired back and dinner roasting by my side. This is where they burst in through the door racing to throw their arms around me beaming from ear to ear with a flower picked from the neighbors yard, a uniquely shaped piece of wood or stone. And so very often lined upon my window seal and along my sink are little cups of flowers, twigs and stones. More permanently are the stones up on the window’s ledge. One in the shape of a surfboard another as a heart, some even sparkle. Each and every one possesses some characteristic or quality the boys found worthy as a gift for me. Visitors might scoff and think of me as a little peculiar with all those rocks piled in my window. Little do they know those are treasures rare. If they knew how my heart valued these little tokens of love they’d surely want some of their own. For these little treasures represent my children’s love and adoration for me, their mother. These little tokens touch my heart and tell me that I’m in their thoughts even when I’m not in their presence. These little random acts of kindness spread a smile inside out and I know I am loved and someone is thinking of me. Yes, Isaac it certainly does make me feel good inside.