Flat Stanley

My head awash with the stress of this life

Why is it…

Why all these things

Decisions

Pains

All at the same time

You poke your head out of my bag

And smile

Your static arms

Fixed position

A stable constant

In this world every changing

Your lighthearted ways bring comfort through this

Heavy yoke

Burden unrelenting

With you

Everyday

I find beauty

New

The things I looked at a million times

Are fresh with your eyes

Dinners become gourmet dishes

Buses become extravagant transport

Houses become terraced palaces

I capture the simple

I marvel in the ordinary

I see your work Father in every little detail

In one hand I take sickness

Emotional distress

Secret hurts

Stressful futures

Perplexing decisions

But in the other I take your joy

Words you speak to me through others

Food that I didn’t even know was in the house

Baggy clothes that smell of a husband far away

The chance to help friends learn Facebook

I see the hope

Not in the future

But in right now

The hundreds upon thousands of gifts before me

Piled high

But seemingly hidden behind piles of mud, dirt and grime

Distraction

Obstacles

A wall that must be broken down

I hold Flat Stanley’s tiny hand

Raising him high to capture the moment

His adventure makes me smile

Reminding me

Of my adventure

My journey

The process

I want to skip forward

Race through all this angst

But Stanley says that there is something in this moment for me to know

Relish

Learn from

Savour

There is something in each moment

That I cannot miss

That through the tear-speckled eyes I must blink to see to

The gift

My gifts

That are new every morning