And the gift goes on...another year

A year ago, I wrote of my youngest one under the above title. Today, I feel inclined to write of him again.

He never knew my mother as a flesh and bone woman, but he knows my mother in spirit. When fitting, I tell him the funny and engaging stories from her life, and in that way he comes to know her.

A few nights ago, we were "cuddling" on my bed just before his bedtime, something we do frequently. It is a thing precious to us both--an unadulterated joy to him, but one tinged bittersweet for me, as I know how short-lived these moments are, what with him now 6-years-old. On this particular night, we had one of those talks about his grandmother. As we talked, we went to that place visited by most mothers and young sons when those sons discover the chasm that exists between the living and the beloved dead. Those sons look to their mothers to build some sort of bridge across the chasm: and so we flew ahead to that moment when he will meet her, at the gates of heaven. For a child to consider such a thing is no great feat; to him it is perfectly natural.

As we were speaking of what it might be like--that day when we are all reunited for all eternity, I was sitting propped against my headboard and he was wallowing all around the bed. But he paused on hands and knees just beside me, lifted his head to look me deep in the eye and laughed an open, deep laugh, an utterly free laugh almost never heard but where it is ringing from the throat of a small child.

"I can't wait to die," he said gleefully, and then dropped down to put his head on my shoulder.

I wonder what life would be like if we could all still see heaven with the eyes of a child?