We spin and spin and spin, one child after another and my head swirls as I fall into the grass. It’s been way too long since I let them wrap their arms around me and swing them ’round. One squeals in delight, one screams in exhilaration, one goes aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh with his voice wavering up and down, and one laughs and laughs and laughs. My heart races, but not from the spinning. I love their unbridled happiness, how each one does their own thing, personalities gleaming through the swish and swirl.

I’ve been listening a lot more lately. I laid in the grass so long one night that dew settled on top of me, soft, almost imperceptible. I looked up at the sky and watched the clouds pass, some scurrying along and others dragging, tired and sluggish. It is night, after all. And when they all had gone their own way, there was nothing left but me and the stars. I’m not sure where the moon ran off to. Maybe playing hide and seek with the horizon. I found myself spinning and spinning and spinning, heart racing and full. Here I am, just a girl in the grass. The stars seem so teeny tiny and I so big. Everything is relative, isn’t it?

As I sunk into the ground, I felt the grass cradling me. I heard the air, really heard it barely sweeping by. A bird. A car far off in the distance. Crickets going and going and going. Do they ever stop? A bullfrog joins the song and there’s a symphony of sounds in the silence. If we only stop spinning long enough to listen.