I finished John Adams last night and I can't decide who I love more, David McCullough or John Adams. I love that David McCullough loves his subjects as people. By the time he's finished his ten year project on whatever famous guy he's devoted his life and brain to at the time, I'm sure he knows all the goods and bads of the person in painful detail. But I feel like McCullough always chooses mercy and love over cynicism. I appreciate the heck out of that.
And speaking of mercy, John Adams, who McCullough helped me to know as a man who was pricked constantly by his pride, but a man who was true, said this in a letter to his granddaughter near the end of his life, "The longer I live, the more I read, the more patiently I think, and the more anxiously I inquire, the less I seem to know...Do justly. Love mercy. Walk humbly. This is enough."
And this is what catches me. This is what makes me want to read and read and read and read and read. Because of this good, this bit of truth that makes life more beautiful. Do justly. Love mercy. Walk humbly. What if I could do that all the time? That's a perfect sunrise, cool summer evening, quiet snowfall, laughing with children, dancing to your favorite song type of peace and goodness that doesn't end.
I just love the thought of it.
*#1 loves to read. I love that he loves to read. But I still have to tell him to stop reading and do his homework. It makes me sad to have to be that lady.
#2 was sick today and stayed home. I could have her around me all day every day and be okay. She and #4 made paper doll clothes together at the kitchen table. That's #2 - a doll clothes maker 100%
#3 got a hit in his baseball game tonight - he looks so small with a baseball helmet on. He got to first base but didn't know about having to go to second when the next batter got a hit. But he got a hit - "a score," he said later. Outs are a things to worry about when you're seven or eight I think.
#4 cried at bedtime tonight - really at an hour past bedtime - because she got distracted from doing her nighttime jobs and didn't get a marshmallow. Life can be cruel, but at 4 it is so easy to fall asleep afterward and wake up with nothing but marshmallow possiblities ahead.
#5 has to get a heart surgery in a week and a half. Tonight he came into the dining room proud as could be because he put his shorts back on all by himself after he went potty. They were on backward with his shirt tucked in them. I love the boy.
#6 was the only child that really appreciated my Cauiflower Curry Soup tonight. He had three bowls and an amazing logger-looking lentil bean beard by the end of it all.
The Husband is so doggone responsible and good to his wife and kids while trying to keep everything else going. He's got his first draft of his thesis done and got some papers done ahead of time for class just in time to have to write emails and put in grad school applications because life threw a curve ball at him and told him he needs to run in five more circles than he already is. The boy is a good one.
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