Thursday, May 20, 2010

Broken Records

We are a group of moms, in various ages and stages, bound by our friendship with one another and with Christ. And today we have escaped the routine to join for lunch at los panchos; casual dining suitable to toddlers and lively conversation.
Mexican music plays and we dance as we enter the happy chaos– full of joy at being together. Salsa and chips, conversations darting from one thing to the next, interrupted by spills or giggles, by runaways and more napkins,
we carry on, not a bother.
I am surprised by the fullness of my heart at this table.
A little one sharing a French fry with "baby" Michael, just the tiniest dab of ketchup on the tip, carefully placed there just for him.
Her smile when she is praised.
A mothers sharing of her son's minor car accident leaving youth group–
how her husband went to attend to it all while she remained home.
"Everything is ok", her husband said, not betraying the graver details of the drunk driver or the totaled car until the boy returned home; and how she cried at hearing the story of it – car totaled, but everyone fine thanks be to God and a lesson in there too. And then she laughed!
Her mother's heart on her sleeve; right along with the guacamole from her youngest smeared there as she chased him down and gathered him again safely in her grasp.
In the midst of this ordinary moment the music suddenly hit a scratch and kept repeating the same line of melody over and over again, and soon enough they'd fixed it and it went on with another tune altogether.
We joked that there was the stuff of a new talk for moms – the broken record. We've all been there!
I listened and thought of all I had been drinking in.
The melody repeating around tables everywhere,
the beautiful broken melody of women loving life into the world.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you.

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