My apologies (to myself more than anything) for not following through and writing a post yesterday. I have to admit I was wound tight trying to get last minute ‘work’ things done before my parents made it into town and at the same time trying to appease my son who had a pretty rough nigh the night before. Something woke Seth up in the middle of the night and he says his bed was shaking. He says he felt himself and then felt Bailey (who sleeps with him ) to make sure they weren’t shaking the bed and when he realized it wasn’t him or the dog doing the moving he hightailed it out of there and ran down the stairs to our room. That evening I slept crammed between him and Neal in our queen bed!
Far be it for me to shrug off what truly left an impression upon his 9 1/2 year old mind. I didn’t go too far into explaining why I understood sometimes ‘seeing’ or ‘feeling’ things around but I did tell him the next time he felt that happen to say ‘In the name of Jesus go away!’ so that day he came running down the stairs (in broad daylight) saying that he heard a ‘knock, knock, knock’ on the wall and did as I said and the knock went away. I could see he felt more ‘impowered’ by this but that didn’t keep him from literally being by my side ALL DAY LONG – literally. By the time my parents made it in that early evening I was ready to surgically remove him. 🙂
However, the arrival of Mema and Papa didn’t make it any better as they brought some of the items from my grandmother (aka: Sweetgraw) that my mom felt I would want to have. She brought the kneeler (that I truly believe is a gift straight from Sweetgraw) and also an old oil painting in a gorgeous oval frame of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The minute I saw this picture I was taken back to when I was Seth’s age, running through Sweetgraw’s old Victorian home, going up one side of the stairs, staring at the painting and watching the eyes follow me as I went down the other side of the stairway. I loved to do that over and over again, watching Jesus watch me. And now, here he is again in my home. 😉
Unfortunately, Seth is not too keen on this oil painting. His eyes seem to follow you whichever direction you go…and that ‘creeps him out’. I wanted to put on the hall wall by the staircase but he began to cry saying he’d have to see it every time he walked up and down the stairs. I tried to convince him that was a good thing, UNTIL my dad (Papa) said, “Yeah, and imagine if one night you actually see Jesus step out of the painting.” That brought him to tears. 🙁
At first I wasn’t going to put the painting up at all but it brings good memories to me and I know that Seth will soon come around so I compromised and put it on a wall that he can easily ignore it if he’d like. Now that I have the kneeler, the painting and a few other things of Sweetgraw’s I feel she is even closer to me in proximity. There is no real value on things but the nostalgia of the memories they bring is like opening a gift to see the good in all the years of the past. How often do we fret over the bad that has been done but forget the good that forms our spirits and gave us the hope to endure.
I pray you all can drum up some of this ‘nostalgia’ tomorrow as we celebrate another year of thanksgiving for the hope we’ve been given in another year. And eat without counting calories! 🙂
🙂
Blessings
Shannon