Mrs. Miniver the Mother

Zac has not developed a massive mole.  He's sucking on a nerf bullet.

I've mentioned the book, Mrs. Miniver, a few times before but something happened this week to remind me of this passage (which begins with an introduction by a reviewer):

So much of the fun of parenthood lies "in watching the children re-make, with delighted wonder, one's own discoveries". On Christmas morning, when they burst in shortly after six to open their stockings: how odd, she reflects, that the tangerine in the toe of the stocking lingers even though children get a good supply of fruit all the year round.
This is one of the moments -- when the stockings are being opened, and the dawn is breaking, and she can hear the distant tinkle of teacups -- which Mrs. Miniver feels

paid off at a single stroke the debit side of parenthood: the morning sickness and the quite astonishing pain; the pram in the passage, the cold mulish glint in the cook's eye; the holiday nurse who had been in the best families; the pungent white mice, the shrivelled caterpillars; the plasticine on the door-handles . . . the alarms and emergencies, the swallowed button, the inexplicable earache, the ominous rash appearing on the eve of a journey; the school bills and the dentist's bills; the shortened step, the tempered pace, the emotional compromises, the divided loyalties, the adventures continually forsworn...

Isn't that what it feels like sometimes?  You're about to be buried alive by a mountain of petty frustrations ('I've made that stinking train track six times already.  Stop messing it up if you want to play with it!') and then you're handed a gift that transcends them in a second.

Zac takes a bath in the sink and hands out transcendence.

Jonah was making his lunch this week and was thinking out loud.
Him: Mom.  Dad.  Child abuse is wrong, isn't it?
Us: Yes, of course it is wrong.
Him: It would be like me taking advantage of Spencer because he's so little.
Us: Yes.  What made you think about child abuse, Jonah?
Him: I was just thinking about how lucky I am to have a safe home and parents who love me...

... paid off at a single stroke the debit side of parenthood...

Thank you God for letting me be a mother.

I also ran across this article this week titled 'Why We Have Children'.   I love this passage:
In retrospect, however, my life prior to parenthood was like a symphony constrained to a single note. In the year that followed my daughter's birth, I felt—really felt—the whole spectrum of human emotions, the depth and richness of human experience. Through my daughter's eyes, I remembered wonder. Her laughter and unbridled joy reminded me why the world is good. She was a vessel of grace, a sacrament, and she returned me to life.She made me human. We make children who make us.