A Meaningful Life

Moses requested strawberry shortcake for dessert tonight.

We sat on lawn chairs in our postage stamp of a yard with the most perfect robin chirping right over our heads. In between bites Abigail swung from a branch wailing like Tarzan, and the conversation turned to the meaning of the word "education."

Moses said, "I think education is learning and having fun at the same time." You know I was 100% on board with that.

Nick said that to him education is acquiring the skills and knowledge to build a meaningful life. And that was so beautiful and good and true it almost hurt.

Abigail said, "I don't know what you're talking about, but can you please read Uncle Elephant to me?" So of course we did.

As I looked at my 3 favorite people and thought about what it means to live a meaningful life, I thought back to when Nick and I were teenagers imagining what we wanted our family to be like.

I didn't know it would be in this zip code, and I didn't know it would be these endlessly interesting humans I would be doing life with, and I didn't know there would be nearly this much heartache to get here, but this is what I thought it would feel like.

My heart is full. And that is enough.