| Sunny Side Up May 24, 2006 �2006, Kathleen Gibson Holy Moments with the Bean When Moses encountered the burning bush, he stood in the presence of God, and that was holy ground. When biblical priests entered into the most sacred place in the Hebrew tabernacle, that was holy ground too. And when my thirteen-month-old grandson, he of constant wiggles, rests his tousled head against mine and stays there for two full minutes (all in broad daylight, mind you) well, that's pretty holy too. He joined us for lunch today, Benjamin Bean. Brought his mom along. His dad, on lunch hour, brought in his lunch kit and pulled up a chair too. Benjamin ate his own lunch first, then climbed into my lap. Looked my plate over curiously. I'd piled on it a salad of lettuce, tuna, apple and celery. "He likes tuna," said his mom. "He has his mother's tastes, not mine," said his dad. But Benjamin carefully lifted a strip of lettuce, sucked off the dressing, waved the bare piece over the top of the salad, put it back into his mouth, sucked, and repeated. "I think that was supposed to be a dip," I said to his mother, but by the time I'd figured that out, he'd begun on the apples, and finally the celery bits. A movement outside the window caught his eye. He stopped fishing in my salad and pointed to our birdfeeder. "Those are birds, Benja-bean. Eating lunch, just like you," "Sparrows, Benjamin," corrected the resident Preacher. "Those are sparrows. God sees the little sparrow fall, I know he cares for me�." He sang that last part. Benjamin finished with the birds, the apples, the celery and lettuce (no tuna, mind you) and toddled into the living room on important business. Minutes later, partway through his diaper change, he escaped from his Mom and crawled to me. "I'm going away for three weeks, Bean. I'll miss you. I might cry every night. Don't you forget me," I'd told him over lunch. Now he clambered up, pressed his face against my cheek, and held still. Benjamin is sometimes quiet, but rarely still. Together we stared out the window, where newborn willow catkins danced for the single bud on the neighbour's crab tree; where a few hours earlier I'd chased a squirrel from the sparrow house on one of the elms. He didn't move, even when I stroked his bare leg. Just stared out the kitchen window, mesmerized. By what? The waltzing willow? The quilt-bat clouds? When his mother was Benjamin's age, we rarely stared together. At least, never when the food sat drying on the plates; or the floor needed sweeping, the man feeding, the clothes folding, the older brother chasing. God seemed not so close in those harried days. "I'd like to leave," said the Preacher. I'd forgotten he was waiting for me to run an errand with him. But we kept staring, the Bean and I. Staring and being still. Together. "Just wait," said I, softly. "We're having a moment." God. Holy ground. In my dining room. Respond Home |
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