week ending jun 10, 2007:

Week ending June 10, 2007: This week I went to Great PopPop’s funeral and listened to my mother speak beautifully about the thoughtful and caring way in which Great PopPop had raised her. She sited walks in the woods in which he taught her how to notice the little nuances of nature that she might otherwise have missed. Later in the week I was hurrying to get the kids ready for an outing and I ran through the back yard to get a toy Chloe insisted on taking with her. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a small blue shape in the middle of the grass, so tiny it could easily have been missed. It was part of robin’s egg shell. In my haste I almost left it there, but my mother’s words popped into my head and I remember how, when I was a child, she had shown a similar egg to shell to me that I might wonder about the little baby bird that had been born from it. So instead of continuing with the task of getting ready to leave, I paused to pick up the shell and called the kids over to tell them about it. I now know that Alex and Chloe won’t remember that they were a few extra minutes late to some outing, but I hope that they will remember that one day their mother shared with them a tiny blue egg shell so fragile that it broke even with their gentlest touch. This one of the ways Great PopPop lives on, in a legacy of parenting children such that they can appreciate God’s gifts.