We ebb and flow through our days, sometimes roiled with the current, often drifting aimlessly, occasionally caught in the undertow. The days go by like a flash book riffled by a casual thumb, with the occasional pause for Thanksgiving or a graduation, a wedding or a birthday, the first day of school or the last day of work.

So many marvelous moments!

*Black and white checkered sheets draped over the kitchen table, couch pillows cushioning the floor, oatmeal cookie crumbs crushed over everything like the jewels from Ali Baba’s cave, two tiny boys hide identically in plain sight, squeezing their juice boxes into a sweet fountain of stickiness.

*There they are again! Leaping from their side-by-side stroller like miniature superheroes their velcroed sneakers clump on to the carpet and they are off, banging away at the petrified wood with a conga beat! In step they patter up the ramps and down, around the Jade and in-between the Lapis Lazuli. Completely unimpressed by the Star of India, they turn the renowned Hall of Rocks and Minerals into the glittering playground of their dreams.

*With the smile and swagger of the Bambino, the tiny boy in the green striped shirt balances his blue plastic bat on his shoulder and squints at the pitcher. One swing and the wiffle ball bangs off the bookcase, pings off the wall and sails over the couch! Then he’s flying around the makeshift bases with the light-footed grace of the great Jeter, past first, the yellow bean bag, coasting past second, the stuffed bear, a toe touch on third, a copy of Busy, Busy World, his little legs churning, his curls bouncing, his eyes honed on home, the plastic Arthur and Friends plate, and he slides! And there you have it! Another inside the living room home run!

*Will it be turkey with avocado and Russian dressing or tuna with extra virgin olive oil, capers and red onion? Brisket with sour pickle or a goat cheese with kalamatas? Hummus and shredded carrot or fresh mozzarella and tapenade? So many lunch boxes filled and then emptied, emptied then filled. Peanut butter and jelly is clearly for everybody else.

*A doughnut on a plate is sweet but a doughnut hung from the ceiling, hands behind your back, icing coating your nose, your cheeks, your tongue before you manage a bite, a bite, a bite, of double chocolate, Bavarian Kreme, or strawberry frosted is so very much sweeter.

***

Little moments scatter through my memory hither and thither, whenever and wherever.

Once, long ago there was high school performance of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, with an arch and scrawny Stage Manager and really a very good Emily, the sound system dicy, the timing a bit off, the blocking a bit stiff, but as earnest and loving and passionate as any show I’ve ever seen. At the end, Emily wishes to rejoin the world of the living if only for a day. Her yearning for the the small, insignificant joys of life, even the mundane and even arduous moments of any day of her time on earth were quietly and exquisitely painful.

She wonders aloud if anyone really understands how valuable, how astonishing even a small, quiet life is. The Stage Manager gently answers, “No. The saints and poets maybe.”

I wonder.

But if not a saint, perhaps those of us who just try to be good? I not a poet, perhaps any of us who just try to put a few words to paper, or work to express ourselves in word or song?

As life flashes by we do remember snatches of wonder. And those moments alone do in fact remind us of how marvelous each life is and how grateful we are to be part of it.