Lessons from the past

Last week, we got away and had some time to play good and hard in the dirt and have a change of scenery.

(Little did we know what was in store for us…)

The girls have been fascinated on and off with all things Native American lately, so I really wanted to take them on this special hike.  Grandma was adventurous enough to come along.

(This picture is of the one easy stretch of trail, about 20 feet long.)

It was wild and rugged, and the pictures cannot possibly do justice to the trail (mostly because I couldn’t even hold a camera except on a few easy stretches).

Mom and I struggled to keep the littles together and our knees were crying by the end,

but the girls absolutely loved it.

It was like stepping back in time for them.

Their imaginations were reeling…

…what could have inspired a person so much over a thousand years ago to stop in this spot and write?

What would it have been like to be a momma, a baby, a little girl on those rocks and in those trails?

It was like touching the past.

It was a long and exhausting hike, but the older girls loved every second of it.

This little lady did not.

She wasn’t feeling well that day and the ruggedness was a bit much for a girl who wanted to get down and walk, but couldn’t possibly.

She screamed the whole way down the mountain.

Her cries echoed off the rocks as petroglyphs stared back at me.

Meanwhile, grandma wrestled a tired three-year-old who would often just plant her bum in the ground and declare she was done.

I couldn’t help but think of mommas for thousands of years who have struggled to give their kids a wonderful life, who must have been consumed with guilt and pain when things went unpleasantly for their children, instead of the life they dreamed of giving.

This hike was just a small, insignificant instance of that, but still, I felt it.

I had wanted the girls to have a quiet, awe-inspiring, reverent experience.

In reality, insistant baby screams echoed off the rocks and the winding, ofttimes perilous paths.

I thought things were ruined for my big girls.

But they weren’t.  As my mom pointed out time and again, the girls didn’t even hear it.

They were so happy to be there.  They were so excited to touch the rocks and to test their bodies on the trail.

In the end, we had given them something wonderful, after all.

It was hard, yes.  But in the end, the gift was received and the wonder felt, and all that they remembered was the thrill of it.

No one talked that night to daddy about a crying baby or a tired toddler (except me).

(Yes, that is the trail.  Thank goodness for red hats that help me keep track of adventurous children.)

The miracle of life is that somehow, when we are trying our best, those gaps that come from circumstance or imperfections are filled, good emerges, and joy is remembered.