Where Are You?

I was wildly productive today. 

I planted a bed of perennials, changed the blade on a miter saw, cut a couple two by fours down to size, nailed fresh planks around an old flower bed border, mulched that flower bed, weeded around some hydrangeas and mulched around them, too. I tightened the bolts that keeps the stairway handrail attached to the wall. I washed the bed linens and folded up the sleeper sofa. I cleared out the fridge, took out the trash, and cleaned the kitchen. I vacuumed every room upstairs, and all the stairs, and emptied the vacuum twice. I mopped the whole house, except the basement, and tossed the mop head into the washer. 

It was a lot of work.

Most of it was hard, physical. 

And I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I was proud of all that effort and productivity. 

But none of it is what I will remember about today. 

Later, when we stopped for pizza at my brother’s house, my niece and I tiptoed out to the backyard to get a closer look at a bunny glimpsed from the back window. We were hushed and furtive. The rabbit bolted away from us regardless, running to a bush in front of the garage. We slowly, silently walked towards the bush. 

The thing I will remember about today. 

The sing-songy way my three year old niece said “Where are you?” as I stared into the bush, her eyes peeking up and sideways at me, her chipped-tooth smile wide across her face. Three tiny words filled with so much innocence, wonder, and personality that they caught me off guard.