Celebrate

Suzette BrawnerGeneral

There is something so humbling about learning a valuable lesson from your kids. When mine say simple yet profound things, I tend to nod knowingly while happy dancing in my mind.

celebrate-j-trav-and-jillJason took Alison on an hour drive to a fun restaurant recently. I asked what the occasion was. And his answer made me smile … big. He explained they had had a very full, sometimes challenging, week with a truckload of moving parts, but they had managed to live it well. They deserved to celebrate.

Jason has never really needed an excuse to party, but that simple statement has caused me to think, a lot. We should celebrate more often; even the days well lived.

When he was eight years old, Travis named all the holidays we celebrate: Christmas, Thanksgiving, 4th of July, New Year’s Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Father’s Day, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s day and Pay Day. Why not rank Pay Day as a national holiday?

We all celebrate the big ones, but shouldn’t we celebrate, even if in some small way, every day? Life can easily get so overwhelming. I text Jill at the end of one of those days and asked how she was doing. She sent back a smiley face saying, “Taking it one moment at a time…”

When we pull it all apart, each individual challenge is just a blip on the radar. It’s the culmination of a string of blips that make us want to go sit at a bar somewhere and say “Keep ‘em coming” like in the movies. However that never seems to solve anything.

So here’s what I’ve learned from my kids. Celebrate the big days and make up some of your own, celebrate the small accomplishments like living well through a challenging week, and take life moment by moment. Enjoy today and celebrate!