There is a time as a parent when you become acutely aware of the quiet, but instead of it inspiring you to relax, it spurs you to investigate as if you are Sherlock Holmes himself. You know what I’m talking about, especially if you have been the parent of young children. In a house of youngsters, quiet comes only at night, and that’s if you’re one of the lucky ones. Otherwise, in a house with toddlers, quiet tends to mean something is up, and, if you don’t uncover that something quickly, the mess that follows the quiet will require some serious clean up. For many, that quiet can translate into siblings coloring furniture, walls, or each other with permanent sharpies, or into flour or some other finely textured kitchen substance being poured out on the floor, or any other number of inquisitive disasters.
We were some of the lucky ones in that we rarely experienced those eerie silences involving toddler curiosity (most of our messes were mama-sanctioned). When our girls were younger, our home was one filled with plenty of noise—squeals of delight, laughter, and, yes, fighting and crying. Naps were not a long-running aspect of their young lives, and so my days were filled with the company of my girls. Honestly, there were days that were exhausting, but I am grateful for coming across gentle parenting mom gurus who blazed a trail for me to follow with invitations to play and learn using many Dollar Store purchases and a child’s natural curiosity. The flour poured out at our home was supplied by me over bed sheets that caught most of the mess.
These days, there is definitely more quiet in our home. While I tend to remain a bit of an orbiting body for my teenagers (they enjoy spending time at times in the same places where I am), they tend to disappear into their own spaces to do their own things. If quiet had meant messiness in their early days, these days it now means prolific creativity, reading, iPad games, or YouTube space videos and Pinterest time. As we close in on the youngest’s birthday in two days, I cannot help but reminisce with a bit of nostalgia about their younger days and with anticipation the young women they each are becoming. As I consider the youngest’s birthday, my mind floods with memories of the two little girls whose creative talents bloomed early and whose days were filled with delight as they wove tales involving stuffed animals and Playmobil horses.
While their love of storytelling remains, their tools are more sophisticated and their insights into life and people have sharpened (though, to be honest, their insights have always blown me away). Walking alongside our teenagers is a privilege I hold close to my heart and as the days come and go, I find I am drawn to putting aside some of the daily tasks that stretch my To Do list longer and longer so that I can spend time with my girls.
Sometimes, my oldest will ask me too many times if I really want to be heading off somewhere with her. Sometimes, my youngest will curl up on the arm of the chair in which I’m sitting and drape herself around me as I read or sit at this keyboard. Those are the kinds of moments that stir my soul to absolute delight. Always, I want our girls to know they rank above chores and To Do list things. I, too, always want to remember those other things will always be there but time with my girls is one of the gifts of parenthood. And, so, in the quiet of this Sunday afternoon, I find myself pausing and smiling as I listen to the silence that surrounds me during this quiet time of day.