A Prayer

Luke happily completed his first few days of school. First grade is everything he had hoped for: he gets to sit by his friend, Noah; he got to be the "line leader"--complete with all the privileges--on the first day of school. (Being an Anderson has its perks in an alphabetized world. Growing up as Jana Wall, I was always at the end of every line, every row, and every attendance chart. Raymond Zuniga and I competed for last place. Oh the stories I could tell you . . .) And best of all: in first grade, you get to sharpen your pencil with an electric pencil sharpener. You cannot imagine the joy of this until you have a chance to hear Luke talking about it. Forget climbing Mt. Everest or winning the Pulitzer--there is apparently nothing quite as fulfilling as grinding your pencil in an electric box. Who knew?!

We are thankful for all the blessings he is experiencing, and I wish I paid more attention to all the really great "little" things in my own world.

On that note, I'm borrowing a prayer, written by Ina Hughes for the Children's Defense fund; Judy Thomas posted this on her blog, and it reminded me that all the joys of our lives AREN'T experienced by SO MANY. Here's a portion of the prayer:

We pray for children
who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,
who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money.

We pray for children
who never get dessert,
who have no safe blanket to drag behind them,
who watch their parents watch them die,
who can't find any bread to steal,
who don't have any rooms to clean up,
whose pictures aren't on anybody's dresser,
and whose monsters are real.

(Judy notes that the complete prayer can be read by googling Ina Hughes.)

I'm glad my children have pictures on lots of people's dressers. I bet yours do, too.

Blessings,
Jana