It’s 5.30am and I have two of my kids in my bed right now. I hear the rustle of the duvet as they both start to wriggle in preparation for the day ahead. It’s like watching this large living organism or a wave in the ocean.
And then, as I move over, I can smell the little one. I’m reminded of how I used to smell her when she was just an infant. I’m reminded of how precious this moment is, of how fast they grow up, even though it’s right before my sleepy eyes. I need to sort out this sleeping situation. With night terrors and missing-toys-in-the-middle-of-the-night, it’s like I can already feel the tsunami that is three of them in the bed with me. Yawn. Or maybe I can just accept that it is what it is. When I was growing up, I was so keen to start living, to start doing “real” stuff. Always in a rush, always knowing that something better was coming. Lying here, with the older one with her head by my feet, I realise how lucky I am. Soon she won’t need Mummy’s hugs, even though she sometimes thinks she’s already outgrown them.
The little one farts. I smile. Yesterday she farted when she was sitting on me and she thought it was hilarious. I think about how my priorities have changed. Clean air is clearly not one of them! And yet, despite this utter feeling of contentment, I know three of them in my bed would be just too much. I’m tired. I need rest. Deep, deep rest. I wonder how my own mother did it. I wonder how all mummies do it. I wonder at the energy that creates and sustains life, and how it is organised, so that we have this drive to reproduce, and then look after our young. Human beings, no, all creatures, are so very curious in this respect. Is this all life is about? Connection? Maybe. We are all connected, even if we don’t all know it and feel it all the time. We are all connected - painfully, irrevocably, in that way we hug our children so hard that they can’t breathe. We are all just one energy. The waves in the ocean, the grains of sand on a beach, the snowflakes in an avalanche, the important one in many. So, as I get up, I think about all the ways I will be conscious of this as I go through my day: when I see someone anxious in traffic, when someone is late to see me, when some(little)one spits food on me, or when I’m paid a compliment. It’s all me.
It’s all energy.
It’s all one.
We’re all one.
