Tonight, the kids were exhausted from swimming all afternoon. Jonah and Evie went to bed very early. At 10:00, Jason and I were watching a movie. Evie got up...twice..and so Jason had brought her downstairs where she was being adorable. Fifteen minutes later, we heard little feet running down the hallway above us. Jason said it was just Jack running to the bathroom. It wasn't, and Jason told me it was my turn to go up, so I did...reluctantly.
Jonah was standing at the top of the stairs, tears streaming down his cheeks. He whispered, "Ah was lookeen fo ya" and gave me the most forlorn look I've ever seen. My heart broke open as I ran up the stairs, scooped him up, kissed his head, and tucked him back under his covers. I stayed there, next to him, petting his firey hair.
He hasn't quite fallen asleep yet, so I'm still next to him, my heart still bleeding a little from this reminder of how much he loves me, and how worried he was that I was gone.
Jonah is the kind of little boy who lives just in the moment; not in the past or future, not a day or hour or even 5 minutes away from the moment. His whole world is in the now. So when he didn't find me, he believed I was gone. I could see all the pain of loss on his tiny three year old face. It was terrible, but also wonderful, because it reminded me just how much I need this little boy. When you're the parent of a boy this challenging, it's important to be reminded sometimes.
A little boy who lives in the moment needs constant attention and entertaining. If he finds himself in a moment that isn't full enough, he fills it up. Once he gets started filling up a moment, he wants to fill the next moment, and the one after that. It's like a chain reaction.
I don't want to shock you, but when he fills up a moment, he wants to fill it with something funny and he finds destruction to be VERY funny. So if Jonah has a boring moment (which happens, regularly) it sets off a chain reacting wave of destruction with broken objects, terrorized dogs and siblings, dumped out containers, and noise. Through the exhaustion of cleaning up so much mayhem, I need a reminder now and then of how much I love my mischief maker.
I also worry about his teen years, the time of life that all boys struggle to make good decisions. Parents everywhere try to instill their children with a) fear of God and b) fear of My Mom Will Kick My Ass If I Do That!
It will be hard for this boy who lives in the moment to remember and put any emphasis on either a) or b). I hope and pray that he makes it through those teen years without doing any real harm to himself. I'm sure that while we're going through it I'll need reminders of how much I love him.
