Dancing

Last night before I went to bed the moon rose over the little stand of Cedars that line the bottom where the road turns. Sweetie had to work late so it was just me and the boys. I had got the guys all ready for bed and that's where they should have been but instead they were out with me looking at the moon and asking when's mamma coming home.

Sometimes when you're so tired your bones hurt and you can't stand up straight. Sometimes late at night it's hard to keep your balance and keep from falling over. You start asking questions of yourself, of your worth. You get the most annoying songs stuck in your head or think about a time when you were embarrassed when you were a kid.

It's easy at times like this to think that everything good is dead. That whatever prime you had wasn't much and a long time gone. But sometimes what's easy isn't exactly what's true.

The oldest boy climbs down off the steps and runs around in the cool wet grass near the carport. He's feeling the part of outlaw because he's in his pj's outside in the dark. Me and his brother watch him running back and forth karate chopping the night, one more battle in an endless war of good vs. evil is waged and won.

His brother and I are laughing at this imperious ballet. This goofy crime fighter, this protector of good. It's then that you know that everything good isn't dead, it's a ghost. It's a shadow figure dancing between these mud puddles and the far off moon.

The tips of the cedars light up and I can hear the familiar sound of the 402 coming up the road. Sweetie's home and I'm in trouble cause the boys aren't asleep. I'll just have to see if I can convince her that the boys really are in bed and these are just shadows of all that is right in the world.