of waterparks,burgers, and whatever else...

Okay. I realize that I talk about kids a lot on here. But as it should happen, they are my life and will be for a very long time, so just adjust to the fact that I’ll talk about them a lot.

The particular kid I’m going to talk about is Anna Joy. Now, I won’t get into all the reasons I love her, but I do. In crazy excess. I also admire this child. She knows what she wants. And she doesn’t want it any other way. Now, this might seem ‘childlike’ to you or like she pitches fits all the time, but that’s not how it is. At all. She just knows what she would like and how she would like it.

From my perspective,as someone who has a hard time deciding between cheese or pepperoni, or which soap to use…this is an admirable trait.

The thing is though, she can roll with the punches. It’s really the best of both worlds. And the cool thing is I’ve gotten to see her kind of begin to grow up. She actually gets now that she doesn’t always get what she wants. This doesn’t mean she doesn’t know what she wants though. But I digress.

I do love this little girl. She is a close friend if I may say that about a child who is 22 years younger than me. I believe she has wisdom beyond her years, though she doesn’t realize it and probably won’t for a very long time.

Now,I’ll get to the point. Which kind of has little to do with Anna Joy, but I just like a good reason to talk about her. Those that know me, know this.

The other day we went to the waterpark. Which isn’t really a waterpark at all. It is a flat area(at a public park) that has ‘squirty fountains’ that spew up every couple of seconds. There are several of these around town, but this is the crem de la crem and as it happens a good 30 minutes from where we live. But, well worth the drive. She has been determined to go there all summer(we tried it out last summer when Jake and AJ were 5 and 3 respectively, and I remember thinking then that this would probably lose it’s luster once they turned a year older.) Contrare. Quite the opposite. I remember one day in the dead of ‘winter’…can you even say ‘dead of winter’ in Austin. Probably not. Suffice to say it was in January-we were trying to think of what we wanted to do and she definitely knew she wanted to go to this waterpark(told ya she knows what she wants). I explained that we could go after school let out for the summer and so ever since school let out, she’s been asking me. So finally…we went. And they were in hog heaven. I watched from the sidelines for as long as I could, but sure enough AJ came over and said… “missssssss Maaaaaaaary…will you please come and play with me?” I didn’t think twice about being the oldest ‘child’ out there by oh say 20 years. She asked. I went. This is the way it goes. Momma may not always have enough energy to play…but Miss Mary???…Miss Mary is ALWAYS up for playing.

And I had a marvelous time. It’s like sprinklers on steroids and really…who can ever resist running through sprinklers on a hot day? A 106 degree day. Not me. So we had a grand ole time.

It’s our tradition to go to Sonic afterwards and I’m not one to break tradition …so off we went.

So here we sit with our tater tots,cordogs,and milkshakes having a conversation about who knows what when out of the blue she said ‘miss. Mary, who are you going to marry?’

After I played all the thoughts running through my head out, I just answered ‘I have no idea.’

She said, ‘but you need to get married nooooooow.’

To which I asked…. ‘why?’

And she retorted right back with… ‘so you’ll have someone to go to the waterpark with when I’m in kindergarten.’

Talk about a tug at the heartstrings.

Anyways, I asked her who she thought I should marry. After she listed off her dad(long explanation about why that doesn’t work), then her brother(another long explanation), then my brothers(looong explanation…’but why not, if you love them already?’) and our preacher(again…you know the drill)…I told her that I wasn’t sure yet but she could help me decide when he came along if he would be someone who was cool enough to go to the waterpark with us.

Now her brother Jake was with us, but up until this point had been pretty quiet. But all of a sudden he said…“he also shouldn’t make you nervous.”

Let me explain.

These two kids are two of the most daring kids ever. They climb tall trees, they ride their bikes fast, and they do crazy gymnastic- like things. So I always say… “oh, Jake…you’re making me nervous over there.” or some variation of that pretty much each time I hang out with them.

I laughed at Jake’s response and then asked what else this future husband of mine should be like.

And oh my goodness…their little answers were nothing short of priceless.

I won’t get into all of them, but I’ll tell you this much. I could make all of them into ‘real life non-negotiables’ on my ‘list’ if I really wanted to.

For instance… ‘he must want to go to the waterpark with us’ translates(to me at least) into ‘he must love kids.’ this is oh so true.

The whole ‘make me nervous thing’ is easily translatable as well. After all, I can’t be with anyone who is ‘making me nervous.’ Maybe making me nervous by swinging from tree branches isn’t going to be the case, but there are other things that can make a girl nervous about her fella. Such as, wondering if he’ll ‘be there’ in this situation, or wondering where he is. These are things that can and do make girls nervous. And it isn’t right. And definitely not what I want.

But you get the point, these kids had the right idea on a simpler level. The one that may have cracked me up the most was…

‘he’ll get you a donut at church.’ And do let me explain. Our church does have donuts and coffee after church each Sunday. Blame it on my daddy or praise him for it, but I associate Sunday mornings with donuts. And I associate donuts with love. So what kind of girl would I be if I didn’t eat a donut on a Sunday?

Exactly.

But it is not completely socially acceptable for ‘adults’(is that really what I am??) to run over to the donut table right after the service. And then by the time it is socially acceptable, all the good kinds are gone and all that’s left is like… cake and crème-filled. SICK!

So, I’ve worked out a bit of a system with my kiddos. And not just J and AJ-but all the little loves I get to call my friends. And they run to go get me a donut so I don’t have to.

My point is…I could translate this suggestion for future mate in a lot of ways.

First off, he’d be at church-which is important.

Secondly, he’s be ‘taking care’ of me. Now, I understand that donuts might not fall under ‘basic needs’ to most, but I’m a bit different. Donuts, particularly on Sunday morning are a bit of a basic need for me. Can’t help it, my dad spoiled me like that.

All kidding aside though, it was just so interesting to listen to their little thoughts and then match them with the bigger things I see and think are important.

Now I know this is a bit lengthy, but you’ve stuck with me thus far, so I ask you to stay a few minutes more.

Okay, a couple of days after the waterpark, we were at our favorite restaurant…Burger King. Okay, maybe not my favorite, but theirs.

So, we were on the playscape and there was an elderly man in there with his maybe great grandchildren? Anyways, when never he got up to leave and go through the door, my little friend Jake looked at me. I knew exactly what he was thinking and so I nodded and he ran over and opened the door for this man.

Of course I teared up. You know me people. I mean really. That was quite touching. To put it mildly.

And so then of course AJ asked me why it was ‘tender’ and why I ran over and gave Jake a huge hug, which led into a discussion on helping people out.

And on the way home, they were still on the topic of marriage. They’ve each chosen their future mates at age 6 and 4. I didn’t want to tell them that I did this also, and as it happens he’s now married to someone else.
Anyways, they were talking about marrying Ryan(a girl) and Boaz. And I kind of tuned out and started thinking.

Jake opening the door for that man was just soo sweet. And then I started thinking of my brothers helping out my grandparents. And my parents. And loving kids. And being good people. With good hearts. And then I started thinking of all the guys I know that have good hearts. And then the ones that didn’t and in that moment I decided at that moment what was most important to me.

A good heart means a lot of things to me. Too many to get into here. But also, it’s an easy thing to notice I believe.

So it doesn’t matter if he’s tall, dark and handsome or short, albino and not such the looker. He might be shy or the most gregarious cut -up in the room.

I used to always ‘classify’ boys before as Richs,Robs or Johns. (I use the classification system for Mom to get an idea of the kind of boy we’re talking about). And they are all very different personalities. At the root of it though, they are much the same.

They genuinely care for family, friends, animals and even strangers.

They genuinely care.

This doesn’t mean they are perfect. Not in the least, but it does mean that they try and do what is right.

So this was the thought in my head as I put the kids down to sleep that night.

That after all the traits I’d spent hours spinning in my head, none of them really mattered.

I want someone that would open a door for a elderly man. And all that goes with it. Because not just anyone would do that. Trust me on this. I’ve been around long enough to know this one thing for sure.

And then as is the Big Man wanted to drive this point home even more…I got a call from my Bubs that night.

Now he won’t like me sharing this, but I will anyways.

He was in an In n Out in San Diego(yes, let’s all take a moment for jealousy and move on). Anyways, a stranger came up and needed someone to feed him literally. Like, actually put food in his mouth. He was paralyzed and his caregiver was not with him. He asked a couple of people who wouldn’t do it, but you know my bubs-he did it. Or you don’t know my bubs, but he’s just the type of person who would do this. I kept on telling him that I thought it was so neat that he did it and then he asked me…would I?

I told him I’m not sure. I hope I would, but I don’t really know. Anyways, though, that’s another conversation for another 4 page post.

But I do know this. That is just the kind of thing I’m talking about. And any of the brothers would have done this. And do -do things like this regularly. So would my dad.

Not that I always expect someone to ‘open the door’ or ‘feed the disabled stranger’(I kind of do), but that is not my main point. I just think you can tell a lot about someone by watching them interact with other people. With their families, with their friends, with their girlfriends or boyfriends, and yes, even with strangers. Definitely with strangers.

Disclaimer***I don’t claim to be mother theresa when it comes to dealing with people. We all have our on and off days, but what I’m talking about is a general day to day concern and care for someone other than themselves.

So whatever list I make is kind of futile. Because those little things I had on the ‘list’ when I was in 9th grade are silly. Such as ‘gives good massages.’

None of that really matters.(good massages are a plus!)

And truth be told, although Anna Joy and Jake had some great ‘qualities,’ when I think about them more and more, they are all things that root back to just what I’m talking about here. The same people that would do ‘this’ would be there for ‘that.’ And vice versa.

Does that make sense?

I hope so because I’m gonna end this now…it’s gone on too long.