Joy

After church we were walking out to remote parking. Remote parking because our church has 10,000 members. Walking because stroller + shuttle bus = more trouble than it's worth. Regardless, I was bah-humbugging along in my usual frame of mind, worrying over everything I have to do, what I was going to fix for lunch, how I was going to get the 2 y/o in bed for a nap after she'd already crossed the delirium threshold. The steady thumping of my foot falls interweaving with the stroller bumping over the sidewalk cracks laid down the perfect rhythm track for the bitch-rap session in my head. The breeze was picking up and the dried leaves were scratching their way across the sidewalk in front of us.

Suddenly I became aware of another sound as it intruded into my thoughts.

**giggle**

**giggle giggle**

**giggle giggle giggle**

The 2 y/o was giggling up a storm at the leaves scrabbling across the sidewalk. So I stopped and let her loose from the stroller. She immediately started chasing the leaves, trying to stomp on them to hear that satisfying crunch. All the while she was laughing the babbling brook laugh of the young.

What a beautiful sound.

The sound of absolute pure unfettered joy--it hangs in the air like honeysuckle on a late spring evening. It peals in dulcet jelly-bean bell tones echoing across the valley of imagination and innocence.

How can anyone have any care in the world in the presence of such a sound?

I believe it's called perspective.