We are busy. Our family is enjoying the last hours of summer vacation from school. I don’t want to give up this blog, but I struggle to find the time to write. Here is something I wrote last spring.
Changing Sheets
The afternoon sun is my only companion as I step into each of my children’s bedrooms to collect their sheets. Their absence from home persuades me to linger in their rooms to reconnect with them. Today the warm sun sets their kingdoms in a glow.
I begin in the cave, fifteen-year-old Daniel’s basement room, which always has its curtains drawn. I pull them open and the sunlight illuminates the corners. I pause to admire a machine he’s designed and created. There are candy and snack wrappers strewn on the otherwise unused desk. It’s clear that his rug and bed are his places of study. I notice that he’s reading Les Miserables. I pause at his mirror where old medals hang from one side, drawing my eye downward to his shelves, once occupied by collections, now occupied by more food wrappers and clothing he’s outgrown. The cluttered corners of his room are evidence of a young man in transition; childhood toys are no longer a pastime, but a few remain in sight. I smile to see that I can still count on him to hang up his church shirt. I sweep a few wrappers in the trash and slip the white shirt from its hanger into the hamper. I’m thankful for this young man in my home.
Twelve-year-old Timothy’s room, unlike Daniel’s room, is bright and warm from the sunlight coming through his blinds, which he never closes. Here, his treasures are also in ready view and they are unique. A Halloween wig and beard are displayed, a remnant of the work he and I go through every year to make just the right costume. He doesn’t have cluttered corners. His shelves display small toys earned at school and baseball trophies. After changing his sheets, I pause to admire the Lego Star Wars Clone Troopers arranged on the window sill in formation. Timothy’s methodical placement of toys is evidence of the gift of precision that he shows in most activities in his life. His Lego figures posed in silly scenes remind me of his humor, too. I tell myself that next time I need to correct him, I should use more humor. He’ll respond to that.
Eight-year-old Mark’s bedside shelf is piled high with books; books he’s inhaled, re-read, and will read again. Among the Harry Potter and Creature from My Closet books is a 1000-page Archie comic book. His bedding is a mess because the dog likes to nest in it. I’ve allowed it because Mark needs the dog’s company. This room, too, displays important treasures: postcards from a special Sunday school teacher’s travels, space ships, robots, and stuffed animals. This room houses my most affectionate child. Thoughts of him playing with his toys in this room wrings my heart. I’ve learned that little boy days are so brief. I step over a rumpled rug and smooth his suit, hung hastily in his closet and move to the next room.
Objects aren’t the only clues to a person’s activities. As I walk into eighteen-year-old Paige’s room, my busy thoughts are hushed in this somewhat cluttered place of intense study. Her quiet ways seem to have embedded themselves into the mood of the room. She is religious: her scriptures at her bedside and her art choices on the wall show me what she chooses to look at. She is busy. Her school papers are accumulating on a shelf. Some stacks are months old. She displays beautiful things: paintings, photographs of friends, and favorite books. I take a minute and sit on her bed before I change her sheets. I notice her closet, arranged by color, and her palette and paints on her desk. I try not to think about the short time she has left at home, but the days march forward in a relentless rhythm of lasts: last Christmas, last youth activity, last everything. Tears crowd me as I realize that we won’t hear her step in the hall and her hands on the piano in the autumn. The upcoming change makes the air feel tight in moments like this when I am alone. I sigh, brush away my tears, and hope that I cherished our time together enough. Then I get back to work.
In the afternoon sun, I do a small service and change sheets and discover my family. My children probably won’t remember that I changed their sheets, but I hope they will remember that I knew about their lives and loved them. This is one of the ways that I accomplish this. Someone once wrote that a homemaker makes something great out of that which is small. Changing sheets is no exception.