Pitter Patter

It’s been a very long time since we had the patter of little feet in our home.  Even the youngest grandchild’s feet don’t patter anymore.  They run and jump.  I live too far away to hear the patter of my great granddaughter’s little feet.  But for several days now, I’m hearing the sliding and shuffling of feet in flip flops.  It reminds me of when those feet pattered. 

I’ve been traveling.  Nothing new for me I guess.  However, of late, I’ve done less.  I visited a church I called home for many years.   I wrote about my visit the other day.  It was wonderful.  More wonderful was seeing friends.  And the most wonderful of all was seeing three of my gorgeous daughters.   I am blessed to have five gorgeous daughters.  The eldest and the youngest I get to see with regularity as we live in the same area.  These daughters, I hardly get to see.  I know they don’t realize how much it grieves their mother’s heart to not see them.  And the cherry on the top was seeing three of my wonderfully beautiful grandchildren.  It was a good trip to Connecticut.  I am praying again to go back.

It seems not only has life caused me to travel, but it has caused me to move.  Of late, people from my childhood church of Salem Gospel Tabernacle have been posting pictures.  Here are two. 

That’s me on the far left.  Looks like we were practicing to sing for Jesus.  All those girls are now on Facebook but one.  We all live so far away in both time and space from that day around the piano. 

This picture is of a Sunday School picnic.  That’s me behind the woman in the middle, hands on hips, with the sunglasses.  That woman is my mother.  Those days at Prospect Park were the highlight of faithfulness to Sunday School.  They also signaled the mass exodus to Long Island for the summer by those more fortunate than us.  I would miss them.  I would miss Sunday School.  For two long summer months, there would be no Sunday School songs or flannel graph lessons.

These photos show how far away from my past I am.  And yet, that's how my life has been, always moving.  I am helping someone else move right now.  Soon I’ll hear the shuffle of those flip flops.  One of those gorgeous daughters is starting law school next week.  She filled her car with her laundry and personal item.  She also included her mother.  She’ll be back from cleaning and laundry in her new apartment.  Two days and over a thousand miles in the car and we’re here in Florida.  Like the day she came into the world, I have the privilege of being part of her entrance into a new world.  She’ll not have the comfort of family nearby.  She’ll have her inner strength to guide her supported by the prayers of her parents.  I wonder if she'll look back in some place far away from her roots and wonder how she got there.  That's how I feel at times.  I wonder how I got here.

I miss the days when her feet would patter.  I miss the days when I heard the patter of little feet.  But I love and relish these days.  These days, I see those little feet walk into a bright future.