You Are Lucky

We are sluggish on Monday mornings. We move in sweet slow motion, orbiting each other, rubbing our blue eyes awake. We cuddle and do all the things we must do. Dress. Eat. Put on shoes and tie them. The laughter is of a quieter variety. The affection is there, mixed in our moments. 

The yellow school bus comes. In my pajamas and glasses, I usher the girls toward the open bus door. Kiss them. On cheeks. On heads. On ponytails. Have a good day, I say. I say hello to the driver. My husband and I wait on the sidewalk for the bus to pull away.

We wave.

I decide to go around the corner to Starbucks for a hot green tea. I fish a twenty from my wallet, grab my keys, stuff it all in my jacket pocket. I walk to the corner in an almost meditative daze. 

There is a small line and I wait. I order my tea and the barista makes it and I fumble for that tucked-away twenty, but it is not there. He hands me my tea and I fumble for words. I will be back. I can't find my money. He is kind. He agrees. He trusts me. He lets me go.

I walk home, retracing my steps. Halfway down the block, I see something on the sidewalk and I know. I pick up speed. Yes. It's there. A little rectangle. The twenty.

I bend over and pick it up, put it back in the pocket from which it fell, feel myself smiling. 

I found it on the street, I say to the barista, handing him the money.

You are lucky, he says.

I am.

I walk home. Again. I sip my tea and burn my tongue, but I don't even care. The day has become something more. It's not just a Monday. It's more. I sip and I swallow and marvel at the mystery of it all. The goodness crammed in the cracks of mundane days. The reminders that the universe has our back sometimes, maybe more often than we think.

Tea gone, paper cup tossed, I'm awake now. I think of my girls, beginning their days across town at a school that was once mine, sitting in classrooms, learning, laughing, living. 

I smile. Another week beckons. Another week of moments and life, of lessons and struggles and thank yous and blossoms and more. 

Bring it, I think.