He Speaks Superhero

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The Gypsy Mama is hosting Five Minute Friday.

Here are the rules:
We just write. For five minutes flat.

Today’s topic is “I feel the most loved when…”



I hung up the phone rather curtly after I said I love you. I whipped my minivan around the corner, my heart racing, for the last spot in the entire parking lot. Pulling in between those two white lines my soul felt I had just crossed a finish line, outsmarting the luxury vehicle in front of me. I pulled the keys from the ignition, grabbed the stroller already set up, and pounced it on the pavement. It is hard to move three active boys in snow gear, each hauling a backpack, up a long side walk to the front doors.

I was questioned at the front desk about our final destination. Frustrating to be stopped in a hurry. Why couldn't she be efficient as me? Did she not see my son in a swimming cap? Fast and furious we sped past her, sprinting for an elevator that was stuck. So I threw the door open to the stairs, and sent the older two corraling down the flight. I urged the eldest to undress his brother at the pool deck, while I dragged the stroller backward down an entire flight of stairs.

In the lobby of the pool  deck, I finished flying the clothes off my son, down to his swim trunks. Swim lessons in Massachusetts at night with three kids in the dead of Winter? What was I thinking?

Finally. He was in the pool just as the lessons began. I relaxed. I wasn't running anymore. Now, just to manage the wriggling toddler and the chatty first grader, and hold a conversation with the interested mother next to me.

And then I saw him. My heart stopped, and then it sung. Straight from the airport, straight from his delayed flight, in just an oxford shirt, sans winter coat. I announced to the entire pool lobby, "I have just been rescued!!"

I feel most loved when he speaks his love language to me, not mine. Forgetting my sharp goodbye in the parking lot, he came straight to the poolside to lend me his hands. He said not a word, and lifted the wriggling baby from my lap and held him in his arms as he watched the swimming son through the window. Despite my frazzled, broken communication, he showed up.

STOP.