Another Daffodil Moment

I love my 3rd hour.  They are such a great, smart, bright group of kids.

And they definitely know how to get their teacher off task, and that is to ask her about her kids.  They call it "the 3rd hour magic."  It's actually pretty cute.

I told them about daffodil moments, which are moments where you are so overwhelmed with blessing that you just have to take a moment to step back and appreciate it.  I'm working on a way to weave this idea into a writing project where they identify their own daffodil moment.  I'd like to see what they come up with.

Anyway, I had another one today.  My son and I had just dropped my daughter off and we were driving to preschool.  It was still dark outside and it was very quiet in the car, and all of a sudden, from the back seat, I heard:

O say can you see
By the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed
At the twilight's last gleaming

It was the most amazing sound.  My son, bless him, is not much of a singer, and some of the words were completely butchered, as often happens with 4-year-olds who try to pronounce big words, but I understood exactly what he was doing - singing the national anthem.  He must have learned it in preschool, because we have not taught it to him.

As I listened to him sing, I began to tear up, thinking about how precious he is, and how blessed we are to be raising him here, in the United States of America - in a place where he can grow up to be anything he wants to be.  He has the privilege to go to school.  He will have the choice of his profession.  He doesn't have to work every day, picking raddishes and trying to sell them at market, like the little Uyghur (pronounced "Wee-gur") girl I'm reading about in The Vine Basket by Josanne La Valley.  It seems like there are so many people complaining about so many things going on in our country.  But isn't it great to think about all the things we do have?  Food? Shelter?  The freedom to go to church and worship as we please, or to speak about whatever we feel, or to choose to move to another town or city without having to acquire permission from the government?  How many rights and freedoms are guaranteed us by our Constitution?

As I listened to him sing, as I soaked up another daffodil moment, I was reminded of how  very blessed and thankful I am that my son gets to grow up here, in the land of the free and the home of the brave.