What are you doing with today's square?

Finally, days after January passed and February slid in, I put up my 2009 wall calander. Dissapointed, Lydia asked why we couldn't leave it on the "ice skating" picture that was January and I set about trying to explain the way months and days all fit together to form a year. I watched and patiently listened as my words bounced around inside of her and came back out as a series of questions. And while I tried my best to clarify it for her, I'm not sure it made much sense at all.

Yet, as I sat there with her, flipping through the calander, looking at each of those tiny squares marching across the pages I realized how long a year must seem in a child's eyes. How very many opportunities (365 to be exact) we have to wake up and find ways to make all those little squares feel complete.

I was inspired. Inspired to see those squares as a new beginings and empty slates once again- much as a child might do. This time of year it is especially easy to stare at those boxes and calculate how long it will be before spring arrives, or a break from school begins, or a vacation comes. But when one thinks of it as a young child does, those terms such as "a month from now" have very little meaning. A month to them is a vey long piece of time, as is two days, or a year all the same. And while they might try to grasp it, they just as easily put it out of mind and live for right now. For that little box that is today.

And that's what I'm attempting to do. Not to see February as the month in which winter trudges along showing little relief, but to view every day as a new chance to appreciate the simple things that make each day a good one. And even as the squares become scribbled over with places to be and things to get done, appointments to keep and bills to pay, I hope I can remember that those are not the things that make each day. Those are simply the fillers that should be stuffed around the important things. Because it is those little important things, after all, that make those boxes complete.