A Little Perspective

You know when you have one hard day after another and you're just tired of all the crap? That's been me lately. I noticed the other day that I was being pretty damn snippy with Kellen - riding his butt over stupid little things like tugging on my clothes or being too loud in the house. In my defense, he's ALWAYS tugging on my clothes, so much so that I feel like every shirt I own has been stretched so much that it now fits me more like a garbage bag than a shirt. And the boy is constantly L.O.U.D. I swear he has only volume setting and his off switch broke a long time ago.
It was at the end of one of these particularly hard days that I decided to take a walk after dinner to sooth my rattled nerves. It was almost dusk and the air was warm and scented with the heavenly fragrance of lilacs- one of my favorite flowers. I decided to stretch my walk out a little longer so I took a back route that ran alongside a cemetary. I hate cemetaries, but you can't beat the quiet there so I turned and walked into the gates. This particular cemetary is actually a very pretty place - very green with lots and lots of flowering trees and shrubs. It's secluded too - set back against a backdrop of woods that borders my neighborhood.
I kept walking and rounded a corner where I noticed an area with lots of flowers, toys, and
stuffed animals adorning the gravesites. I had found the cemetary's "Babyland." It was like I was drawn to the graves. The first one I read was for twin little boys who died March 2007 -just days before my second son was born. The second gravesite was for a little boy who passed away March 18, 2008 - 11 days before his 1st birthday. I started to cry as I walked among the little gravestones looking at the little toys, poems, and stuffed animals that had been lovingly placed on nearly every grave, no doubt by parents and famliy members whose hearts are still broken and empty from the loss of a child. I wanted to know what had happened to them - what totally unfair tragedy took such sweet little souls from this earth? I thought about my two little boys and how sometimes I get so fed up with them and I felt so small and ungrateful. I bet the parents of the little ones whose graves I stood next to would give anything in the world to have their children with them today.
I left the cemetary and walked home, crying the rest of the way. When I walked through the front door, I heard Kellen's voice in his bedroom. It was almost 9 and he should have been asleep by 8:15. Usually I get irritated when he farts around at bedtime, but this time I was actually happy that he was still awake. When I walked into his room he jumped out of bed and yelled "mommy, you're home. I was waiting for you" His voice was the sweetest sound I had heard all day and the weight of his body in my arms was the best feeling in the world.