Joy

The stream of sirens--ambulance, fire truck, four police cars, maybe it was five--is the first thing that snaps me into reality. The policeman said someone was watching out for us up there, that's for sure, because we shouldn't be walking away.

When you come terrifying close—fractions of a second—to unthinkable loss, you gain a sudden, deep-down-profound appreciation for what you have—and how lucky you are to have it. For all those little things that come and go unnoticed, set aside or admired briefly before being let go—like a balloon floating so quickly into the sky, its shape disappearing into a pin-prick until it’s so small that you can’t remember the joy of the thing in the first place. 

The policeman said he hadn't ever seen anything like it.

So we give longer hugs. We stare at them in their sleep. We watch fireflies instead of rushing upstairs to brush teeth and take a bath by the stroke of bedtime. We answer Cass' circular barrage of strangely connected questions without irritation. I let Ollie unravel the toilet paper just so I can see that glimmer of joy and mischief behind his eyes, and then I scoop him up for a giant belly laugh. We don't complain, wouldn't dare. We let Cass slip and slide in finger paint. We play in the flowers and dig dirt trenches in the vegetable garden. We jump on the beds. We build a fort at 6:30am. We look at each other, shrug our shoulders and let them have a little fun, because why not. We hang onto that feeling of gratitude for another day, hoping it doesn't slip away. Hoping we never have another reason to cradle a trembling child in a grassy meadow full of muskrat holes, beside a pond painted with pussy willows and lily pads, and sob openly for the lives we nearly lost.

The policeman said we are unbelievably lucky.

We promise each other we will not forget.