Day 4: A breath of life

The week was hard, we all needed renewal.

I looked on my phone in the morning -- 75 degrees -- It's going to be warm. We are going to spend the day outside. I listed options on the white board: yardwork, bike ride, various parks, a trip to the zoo...

Eddie decided the best option was to go to the beach. So we cleaned out the car, packed it up with supplies and headed to Crown Beach in Alameda. For whatever reason, this beach is hardly ever crowded and unlike most California coasts, it is sandy and a gentle place for toddlers to play.

We arrived to a perfect blue sky, a warm breeze and nearly empty beach. Andrew immediately dove into the sand, laying flat, face down, starting to dig. Eddie made "sand angels" I laid out a blanket and smiled from somewhere deep in my soul. After a bit, we headed down to the water's edge. The tide was out and there was a simi-muddy stretch of glorious puddles maybe 30 feet wide. Toddler paradise. The boys took off like rockets - running, splashing and jumped. Andrew shook with excitement, nearly trembling with uncontainable joy. I watched them and my heart melted. I think there was nothing that I could have done, paid for or organized that would have filled them so deeply.

As they ran circles around me I mediated on their joy and on the sunlight, mud and water that surrounded me. I thought about what I might post. I thought of baptism and the freedom we find there - liberation like toddlers running on a beach. I thought about mud and water, life and creation. I thought about how the two were connected. Baptism as a place of new creation, of freedom, of life.

Then, I let myself be. For hours. I let the Spirit wash over me and be a force of life, of freedom and new creation and I was renewed.