In the Night

It’s late at night. The kids are finally all in bed. Even my husband has gone to bed. So it’s just me and the animals (4 cats, 1 dog) I’ve been sipping a lovely cup of hot chocolate with a generous splash of Bailey’s (yum!) and listening to some amazing piano music (http://soundcloud.com/grantwilsonpiano) Peace settles over me, over the house. It’s so wonderful, this all too brief moment when I can just sit and be. No demands, nothing I have to do right this minute. Bed awaits, and I will go there soon, but for now I just want to take some time to revel in this quiet. The day’s stress falls away – mere background noise. It will all be there, waiting for me when I wake up. But for now, I can ignore it. It brings tears to my eyes, this sense of peace, of relief from the usual day to day hassles. Everything falls into place, somehow, and the world feels right. And I can remember, not the petty annoyances each child has caused me today, but how wonderful they all are. How much I really love them. Of course I always love them, but in the middle of an argument it can be hard to remember. Right now, in the peace, it’s easy.
This feeling reminds me of a line from one of my favorite Dorothy L. Sayers novels. It goes something like “Here in the still center of the world” That is where I am tonight – the still center of my world. And it is a beautiful place. One I need to visit a lot more often. May you find your own still center.