Lost and Found

The specter of loss has been hovering in the air for the last few weeks.
The anniversary of a local teenage girl killed in a bus accident last year.
The death of a dear friend which left his wife (also my dear friend and Soul Sister) trying to comprehend the reality that in the morning her husband was there, and in the afternoon he was not.
And of course, all the remembering of September 11...the images, the sounds, the feelings all rushing back as though they never abated.
On a quiet Sunday evening, all this loss makes me pensive.
But it makes me do other things too.
It makes me aware of what I have.  It makes me take time for "I love you" even when I'm running late.  It makes me appreciate Hillary's art and music.  It makes me text Parker from the front seat to the back on the way home from family reunion to say "I'm so glad you were with us this weekend."  It makes me realize what a gift it is to have both children along on a grocery shopping trip...laughing at their mother and throwing Zebra cakes and cheesy hot dogs in the cart..creating more chaos than they ever did as toddlers.
It makes me more patient with my husband when he wants to talk in the morning.  And when we are at a social gathering and he catches me looking at him across the room and he gives me a little wink, it makes me say in my heart "Thank you God for a good man who loves me.  Thank you that I had this day...this wink."
And when Parker returns home at night after "driving around" with his newly licensed friend and comes in my room to let me see that he is all in one piece, it makes me breathe in his scent of four-wheeler and firework and memorize the feel of his hug and the sound of his voice.
The realization that these things could be lost makes them infinitely more valuable.
If I look closely, there are plenty of blessings to be found.