My heart is full.
In two weeks, another semester will begin, but for now I sit in bed back home in Arizona, listening to the dog's tail thumping on the wood and my sister playing with her friend. I say playing, as if Sophie is still the little barely-nine-year-old she was when I left home all those years ago; in reality she just started eighth grade. Eric and Liv are both class presidents. With my parents in Spain right now, I feel like I might get some time to really hang out with just the kids and get to know them better as grown teenagers rather than the cute, goofy littles they used to be.
♡My heart is full with love for Liv, who took me with her yesterday as she ditched school to sneak a slushy to her new boyfriend at a different school and go birthday-outfit shopping with her friend.
♡My heart is full of love for Rach, who on Saturdays when I'm feeling lonely because Dallin works a double will come get sodas, watch a movie or dress up for absolutely no reason other than to take pictures because I've felt like a slob at work.
♡My heart is full for everyone I worked for and with, both clients and staff. Summer Program was the toughest but funnest and more rewarding job I have yet to have. Cleaning poop smeared across the bathroom stall, getting kicked out of the public pool or getting scratched hard enough to leave scars was not necessarily the easiest thing to deal with...but it was all worth every minute. I love those kids with ALL my heart, and I definitely got a little teary-eyed on my last day.
Memorable moments:
- I learned how to tube-feed.
- In a conversation with a thirteen-year-old high-functioning boy
- Me: "If you were a demigod, who would your parents be?"
- Boy: "Zeus or Poseiden."
- Me: "I would probably be a daughter of Demeter."
- Boy: "No no no. You would be a daughter of Aphrodite."
- Me: "Wow! I take that as a compliment!"
- Boy: "You should."
- One of our girls who could hardly say any words, but loved to switch letters with you in a team effort to recite the ABCs. In the mornings, she would do an excited waddle-run to the van. She loved both babies and puppies and would sometimes mix up those two words, but in either case would oh-so-gently give them kisses on the head. One hot park day, she was being pretty grumpy, but we started squirting each other with her water bottle and next thing you know we spent the next hour dousing each other with water from the drinking fountain. She would say "moh" to ask me to fill up more water in her bottle, and I couldn't even finish filling it before she would dump in on my head and say "moh" again! I have never seen her giggle so much, and she kept taking my arm to kiss it.
- A boy who who also didn't speak much who would go off on random vocab spurts. In the theatre, we almost thought he was swearing when he shouted "OHHHHHHH-SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIN. OCEAN!" He was the king of nursery rhymes, and one time a staff whipped out the ukelele and prompted him to sing parts of Old McDonald.
- A boy who got one of the male staff to do "baby voice" and for the next month would always say, "Austin! Say goo-goo-ga-ga! Austin, say bee-bee-ba-ba!" This was the same kid who had a speech and language disorder and called Ashley "Ash-daddy."
- A boy who was typically in his own little world but would suddenly say things like, "Miss, I want to see a picture of heaven and hell."
- A restless boy who loved water so much that he would pause his daily 6+mile walk that the staff always had to accompany him on, and literally jump-skip to random fountains to splash in.
- A boy who loved to whip out a finger gun and pretend to shoot people, and literally couldn't say goodbye at the end of the day without jumping back into the van to hug and/or wave goodbye to every individual person.
I could continue on with a thousand stories, but this will have to suffice. I have loved and learned a lot, and I hope it will help me to be not only a more patient and compassionate speech pathologist, but a better mom.
♡My heart is full for Jordie, who today invited me to tag along errand-running and bought me a darling outfit for family pictures after she already bought my plane ticket! When strangers ask, she refers to me as a daughter and just skips the "in-law" part. I feel at home to share personal matters with her, because she is such a good listener and so caring.
♡My heart is full for Dallin, who I miss so so much after only a few days of separation. He is my rock, and I can't wait for him to fly in town in a few days, so he can hug me and make me laugh like he always does. I love him, and I love calling him my husband.
