Kiss, Kiss

I sure have missed PDub these last few days. He breezed through here a few weekends ago just long enough to play outside with Grammy a little bit. We ran up and down and INTO hills. We watched truck, cars, and motorcycles drive past. We played with the little red wagon. And in those too brief moments, I felt a calm and peace that only comes from spending time with PDub and sharing his wonderment at the smallest of discoveries.  He saw for the first time a little clay rabbit hidden in the straw beneath the pines.  Oooh! He exclaimed.  And then a clay chipmunk. Oooh! again.

Since then, PDub and I have been much too busy.  He is in a new school and I am in a new school and it is just enough to make a body...well...just plain exhausted.

At times like these, a comforting kiss, a gentle hug, an encouraging word...they can make a big difference in someone's day.  I thought of a book that helps when life gets busy or big changes come along and you don't know what you're doing, who you'll know, or whether you will like them or they will like you. 

The Kissing Hand, by Audrey Penn, was written to comfort her own daughter at the start of school.  Audrey had noticed a mother raccoon kiss the cub's hand.  The cub then rubbed the kiss on its own mouth.  And that inspired Audrey to try the same thing with her daughter.  I think PDub would like this book.  I think about the way we pretended to take little hats off a page and place them on each other's head.  I can see him accepting a kiss and taking it with him in his sweet little hand to school each day.  I can also see him giving his mommy a kiss to take with her.  Who will you give a kiss to today?  Need one for yourself?  Here it is.

~X~