I sat down at the dining room table this morning to start planning our next several weeks of school, spread my books in front of me, and dove into the last few chapters of The Well-Educated Mind. I’ve read it before, but the chapters on reasons to homeschool and “socialization” serve as a fine pep-talk to get things started, so I re-read it before getting down to the school stuff. I looked up after a few minutes of reading to notice that my boys had pulled themselves up to the table, each with his own copy of High Five magazine. (My warm regards to Resourceful Mom, at whose Twitter party for Highlights I won a year’s subscription to that magazine. The boys love it!)
My first-grader was reading the instructions for some activity, while his brother mimicked his words and actions. My little girl was off somewhere being a toddler, but shortly before that, she was sitting on her little plastic garden bench, “reading” a baby board book. As I watched them sitting there so quietly, I realized just how blessed I am to have these moments of peace with my children every day! I’ve had people wonder aloud (some quite rudely), how anyone can stand to be around their own children all day long. It’s easy, thank God! They’re learning from me how to be tolerable. (Instead of from 25 other intolerable little people. But that’s really another post, isn’t it?) They are perfectly normal, rambunctious children, but I get to see them during their most productive hours every day, instead of just when they are exhausted, hurried, or directionless.
In disciplining myself to become a hands-on mom (really the only kind of mom worth being, as far as I’m concerned), I’ve spent many a boring moment explaining things I don’t care to talk about right now, reading story-books aloud when I’d rather be reading literature to myself, and playing ball when I’d rather be working on my blog theme (which I will someday make my own, instead of using this stupid brown theme I loathe).
Today, for a brief moment, I caught a glimpse of what awaits me, when these noisy, messy, cranky little people grow up a little more–hopefully just in time to help me diaper a few more noisy, messy, cranky little people. These moments seem to be coming more and more often lately as I learn daily how to manage my household so that our family can grow and learn in peace.
All the financial sacrifice, the difficulty of swimming against the cultural tide, the abject boredom that comes with reading the same book for the thousandth time, the worries about what politician might next try to interrupt our unusual lifestyle with new rules and regulations designed to make chaos of our plans–all of that is just noise. This–these little people sitting around my table, learning to love learning–this is peace.
And I think it’s going to be worth it. Yes, I think it is.
