Viewpoints

1. Kindergarten Jess, mentioned before HERE (number 3) and HERE (the whisper story), started chatting today at lunch about going to Disneyland, which will happen for her as soon as everyone (2 little boys and sister w/autism) at home are potty trained. The conversation moved on to how her autistic sister Jen, when asked what you do in the potty, says "poo" or "pee". Jess was excited Jen could respond to the question, which is very positive as she hardly communicates verbally. The end of our conversation went like this:

Me: Well it'll be nice when you get to heaven and she'll be able to talk to you. She'll probably tell you "thank you" for giving her so many hugs (I've seen Jess give her quite a few hugs).

Jess (with raised eyebrows): Actually, I think she'll say sorry.

Me: Why?

Jess (wide-eyed): Last time she gave me a hug, it was too tight.

2. Today, I enlisted aid from some naughty fourth-graders to help me transfer class sets of textbooks from classrooms to the library. Those guys needed to stay busy while the rest of the 4th grade classes were gone on a field trip to The Grand Canyon. Anyway, as we hauled books back and forth, those guys and one girl kept acting like they were about to have a heart attack from the "heavy" labor. I think they honestly believed it was strenuous, no matter how significantly I let them lighten their loads. I thought it was funny that transporting a pile of 3 teacher manuals could evoke painful moans and require a water break upon delivery. I told them that this work would build character and muscle, and to take a look at their muscles now, so they could see how much they'd grown when they checked them out at the end of our painful task. They sort of believed me (the muscle part) and the moaning died down a bit after they showed each other the "before" muscles. I was entertained the whole morning while watching them lug books around like they weighed 100 pounds.

3. So the mini life lesson I got today from the above stories combined:

Like Jess, I'm sure that sometimes when I view present situations through my scope of eyesight and understanding, there is another pair of eyes from above that twinkle, and have twinkled before, with a knowing laugh. Like my fourth graders, I will have to do difficult tasks. I've already had such tasks that I've moaned about and thought were going to almost kill me. In fact, I can think of times that I'd been reminded that character and muscle were being added upon. Past loads, that seemed iron cast and impossible really were completely doable, though I was wanting the nature of the featherweight business, and man, even though I don't have a six-pack now, you should check out my guns.