A few weeks ago, Baby Girl the Second and I accompanied my husband on a business trip/vacation . Despite long hours in the car and the challenges of helping a nervous child navigate strange beds and unfamiliar restaurants, it was a wonderful trip.
We saw the Independence Day fireworks over the Mississippi River in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
In Greenville, South Carolina, BGS mustered the nerve to make it all the way to the top of the climbing structure in the Children’s Museum, I sat on the bank and put my feet in the Reedy River,
we hand-fed bison from the safari bus, and joined a friend to watch the longest minor-league baseball game any of us had ever seen.
We saw elk just yards off the Blue Ridge Parkway as we drove to Tapoco Lodge, deep in the mountains on the North Carolina/Tennessee border. We chased fireflies beside the Cheoah River.
We spent a beautiful day in Cades Cove, and an exciting one at Dollywood. We navigated the stretch of road known as the Tail of the Dragon – 138 crazy twists and hairpin turns in an 11-mile stretch – several times by day and once by thick dark night.
By the seventh day, Baby Girl was missing home, and I too had started thinking about the road back – and all the things to be dealt with on our return to the “real” world. But as I sat on the porch in the still of sunrise the next morning, the cool air and the trees and the goldfinches and the river all singing together brought me back to the moment, to the glorious richness of right here, this very now.
Shadows lie ahead,
yes. But see how that branch is
dancing in the breeze,
easily bearing its own
weight, and the finches’ as well?
~ Rebekah Choat
Becka's Blog 