Trust and Believe

Perfection. It is in the eye of the beholder and no more so than someone who has fought the Big C.  Two days ago, I had just such an evening, not even a moment, an entire evening and all because I willed it to be so.  

My son-in-law, grand baby and daughter were all home for the evening, unusual to say the least.  The place was a mess, very usual, and they were bar-be-quing.  

Another mess, served up medium rare, in this case.  Yet it was a perfect evening.

I made pasta (because I know Baby Claudia and pasta is her favorite thing in the entire universe next to the Sprout Channel), my daughter made salad and a side dish.  We bumped elbows in the kitchen, took turns picking up the baby who has developed a fascination with something inside the pantry.  We shooed the dogs out of the way, tried to unload and reload the dishwasher (my least favorite chore of all time).  Somebody took out the garbage without being asked.  My son-in-law happily charred animal flesh on the grill on the back deck.  The dogs ran in and out of the house, alternating barking idiotically with play fighting as if their puppy lives depended upon it.  When my daughter put a cooing Baby Claudia in her highchair, I blurted out in a whisper, “I am so happy, I'm afraid to trust it.” 

“Me too,” Brittany confessed.  

But I say trust the happiness.  Trust in those perfect moments of babies eating pasta with their tiny, pudgy hands, smearing it in their hair.  Trust two mangy dogs that nibble the fallen leftovers off chubby baby legs while baby giggles because it tickles.  Trust those moments of perfection because they are there, they really are.  

Trust the baby who dances to music flowing from the Sprout Channel and the dog who snoozes; snoring soundly atop your son-in-law’s reclining head as it if were a pillow.  Trust the golden glow from a fading sunset and the preseason hockey game where your favorite players aren’t even on the ice.  It’s going to be fine; the coach is just weeding out the line up.  Yes, yes of course your team has a shot at the Stanley Cup this season; trust and believe. 

Trust and believe that there will be many, many more moments of perfection and happiness, wrought of ordinary times, mundane events, the very fabric that makes up a life worth living. 

You might not even mind unloading the dishwasher, if only you leave yourself open to absolute perfection.  

You have only to allow yourself the gift of being completely and utterly in the moment.