HOME

Last week being the end of the school year, my children trudged home every day and emptied their backpacks full of papers, books, art projects, etc. they had collected over the past nine months. Needless to say, the thought of going through all of it and choosing a couple of things to save was a little daunting. One day, however, I grabbed a pile of my eight-year-old son's papers and books and started sorting. In the process, I came upon his school journal. I didn't have time to read every page, so I simply flipped it open to see if there was anything interesting. This is what I read first.

"I like to . . .
play soccer out at reses with my friends
eat helthy stufe like brokly and stroberrys
play football and stare worse on the wii
swim and get wet
do my beste in school"

Obviously, spelling isn't one of the things he likes to do, and I am a little surprised by his desire to eat healthy food like broccoli. But, the thing that caught my eye was the last thing he wrote. He drew a picture of our family and wrote, "I like to be with my family a lot."

I immediately choked up when I read those words. Not that I thought he hated being with his family, but the fact that he wrote it in his school journal touched me deeply. So, I read on.

"My family . . .

We like to go to Lagoon;" (can you believe he put a semicolon here? The kid's grammar is atrocious, but then he throws in a semicolon--I love it!) "and my favorite thing to do is play sports like football, soccer, tennis, golf, baseball, basketball and racing; "(another semicolon--they must have had a lesson on these or something. And I love that the kid can hardly spell his name, but he spells every sport correctly) "My mom dose wired (I think he means weird) stuff I would not do like doing like landry every day of her life; (yet another semicolon--and glad he's noticed I do laundry every day) and going on baby rides with my brother; but I still love her very much;" (tears are dripping off my nose at this point, but the next one is the kicker) "My family is the best family there is on the planet."

Needless to say, I couldn't read more for a few minutes because my eyes were full of tears and I couldn't see the words anymore. Sounds a bit ridiculous, I know, but there's just something about your son admitting his love for his family in his school journal that gets to you. When I finally got a hold of myself to sift through a few more pages, I was again touched by what he wrote.

"My Favorites:"
Things to do: sports like football, basketball, soccer, etc.
Things to eat: sweets like candy and ice cream
Places to be: home"

I was expecting his favorite place to be to be Disneyland or the gym or his friend's house. I never thought he would say his favorite place to be is simply our home. But it meant more to me than he could know. And as I reached for yet another Kleenex, my heart was full of gratitude. I wondered to myself if I would list home as my favorite place to be and decided I would. Despite the constant chaos, the never ending list of responsibilities, the continual refereeing, and more, still home is where I choose to be. It's where I get to be. It's where I love to be.

I never did make it through all of the paperwork; in fact, just today I decided to ditch the project altogether and I threw everything else in the trash. But I kept the journal, just in case I need to pull it out one day and remind my son how he once felt about his home and family. Or in case I need to pull it out to remind myself how he once felt about his home and family. Either way, all I can say is that I hope that one day, when it's all said and done, all of us can say that we like to be with our family a lot, that we have the best family on the planet, and that our favorite place to be is home!