When Sore Feet Walk into the Late Night Kitchen.

"Where is the hot water bottle?"

Her head peeked around the corner as my knife slid down the side of the corn cob.
It was an evening in September.

We had spent the day at a fair and her flip-flopped feet had done too much walking for her growing body's appreciation. 

We had done this before, this crying over growing pains in the feet and legs,

so the hot water bottle was a friend she could trust.

Because we shut the heat off in our house when we don't use it,

the easiest way to have hot water for the hot water bottle was to fill the teapot and turn it on.

She sat at the table while it heated.

I had been given fresh corn from a generous farming neighbor,
and so was blanching and then cutting it off the cobs to freeze for winter.

As she waited, she asked a question about somebody she had seen at the fair.

Why would they want to look as they had?

People at fairs can seem bold to unprepared eyes.

Do we as adults really know how much we do that is teaching the little eyes that watch us?

I gave her a list of possible scenerios and reasons people do the things they do,

how they get to where they are when they were actually kids at one time too.

 

Sometimes the pain of life creates a person that is lost inside of their body.
Sometimes people think that the best way to call to the world around them is through a visual demonstration of what they think will attract the attention they long for,
or perhaps they didn't like who they were and want to find a way to change.
Sometimes they are angry.
Sometimes they are confused.
Sometimes they just want somebody to notice them,
to love them.

I hope she will see that we all have choices in life, and those choices lead to what we become,

although at any time we can change.

I hope she will see that wrong choices don't bring lasting happiness or freedom
or love,
but a haggard search for something to fill the void in the heart.

I pray she will see that happiness is peace with God.

At any time, we can call out to God
and He can give the healing,
love,
fill the need that is there.

The discussion leads to another question,

another turn of ideas, emotions, destinations on the path of life.

We laugh about something, and her pretty smile interrupts the pain her feet were giving her.

When the teapot whistles and reminds me that our talking has filled the wait,

I wipe the corn from my fingers and fill the hot water bottle.

It was unplanned, this time of discussion.

It was an important moment created by a painful experience.

I thanked God for the way He does that,

trickles the unanswered questions into a night of a heating teapot and a cutting board of corn kernels...

the workplace of education.