Sometimes

It's true that this weekend was fourth of July and our family celebrated in true fashion with BBQ's, picnics, friends, fireworks, etc...The whole works. We hit up a couple different fireworks shows and I got pictures and of course they'll be blogged, but this entry is about so much more than the standard holiday fare pictures.

Last night as we were coming home from the Longs Park fireworks it was absolute gridlock. Over 30,000 people attending will do that and add to that an already subpar highway system and you have mass congestion. Travis had stayed home because he was tired, didn't want to deal with the crowds, and thought keeping Kody home would be a big help. It was. So last night as I sat waiting in the car with the kids we finally started to move just after 11.

I was feeling really calm despite these extreme conditions because I had decided that my attitude towards this all was a state of mind and what was I in such a hurry for anyway. So as I peacefully crept along, kids asleep, I rolled down the windows to feel the occasional warm summer breeze. I turned on the radio to listen to a little NPR with some great Sunday evening classical music. I was feeling rather contented, but it wasn't until I got out of the city and started heading to Manheim that the traffic cleared out, it got very very quiet, and as I listened to my children slumber - the quietness broken only by the genius of the some of the world's best known artists, I realized that I was breathing in harmony with the Earth. Call me a hippy or cheesy or anything else you want but I felt grounded and centered, calm and clear, and perfectly content.