smartignani

With a toddler, Kindergartner and a grade 1 child, things can get pretty hectic- especially when you’re trying to plan your weekend or a vacation.

Truth is, I feel so blessed to have three little angels in the house. I am truly inspired with how they think, how they talk and how they react to everything. The extreme emotions I can experience in the span of a minute as I watch them are amazing to me- from anger to sadness to surprise to concern- it is a whirlwind and it is exhausting.

My heart is slowly but surely breaking as my 2-year-old transforms from the innocent chrysalis of infancy and toddler-hood to the preschool stage of life. He is using complete sentences, making arguments, wanting to use the potty and singing songs from beginning to end, in tune may I add!

As for my 4 year old princess, she is blooming like a rose with her own set of thorns. She loves her food and hurts anyone who tries to take her food away. She is resilient, optimistic, emotional, empathetic, joyful and can throw a fit of rage that rivals anyone I have ever seen! She is a ball of awesome energy that keeps us on our toes. She is also the only child of the three that can sense tension or sadness or fear and she climbs into my lap, holds my face between her tiny hands and says “I love you mama, it’s going to be ok…ok?” She does this with so much conviction that I feel God Himself is speaking to me through her innocent reassurance.

Finally, and surely not the least of these, is my eldest. She has a personality that fills the room. She is lippy, sassy, intelligent, talented, adventurous and so much fun! She is learning French at school and corrects me every chance she gets. She switches from being a dependable, nurturing and responsible older sister to her siblings to being a complete and utter terror who provokes them, admonishes them and outsmarts them into giving her what she wants. She is innocent, inquisitive and so immensely intuitive. She reads chapter books and she loves to act like a grown-up. I can’t tell you how bright and loud our world is because she is in it.

Some parents laugh about the fact that they don’t nap anymore. Others complain that they don’t have any time to themselves. I always stay awake until midnight just so I can have some time to myself. However, many older and wiser friends told me to enjoy the messy floors, toys strewn everywhere and the noise because one day, it is going to be very quiet in the house when they are gone and I will miss every minute of it!

So I pray that God lets me enjoy the present. Lets me relish every moment I am gifted with my babies. Lets me just breathe in their scent and laugh at their shenanigans. I pray that God doesn’t suddenly snatch me away from them like what happened this past Monday when a crazy man ran people over with a rental van.

I am so stricken by this incident and it is impacting me immensely. I know that one of the victims is a single mother of a 7-year-old-boy. I am mourning her loss as much as her own son only because I am sure she is grieving the lost moments with her baby. What could have been and what should have been. She will be missing all the years of his life where he graduates and goes to high-school, where he gets a new girlfriend, where he gets his first job. She will miss all his joys and moments of insecurity. She won’t be able to hold him or smell him just one more time. This is why I am stricken. I am grieving all the lost moments of these innocent lives that were savagely and carelessly taken on the sidewalks of Yonge Street in Toronto.

I want to pray for the killer. I do. I know that he was autistic. I know he was sick. I know he suffered as his family is suffering from his horrific actions. I can’t though. I feel the need to avenge the lives of those he has stolen with such avid disregard. I want to forgive him but I cannot believe that anyone would be so desensitized to human life. I want to love my enemy but I find myself just enraged with the extent of terror that he inflicted on the streets that day. I would be lying if I don’t say I am wishing ill upon him and curse that day he decided to rent a van as a weapon for mass killing.

I am not sure why God allowed for this. I am distraught at the idea that a loving Deity would just let this happen without preventing it.

All those stolen moments. All those stolen lives. I mourn you.

This post went from cheery to dreary and I am sorry but I needed to vent.

God bless.

Smartignani