Legacy and Gratitude: A Snowy Day with Nichole Nordeman

I stand in my living room, it is 11 AM and 6 inches of snow have already fallen outside, with double that to come. The children are whining and there have already been multiple fights and punishments handed out. The time between morning snack and lunch can be the longest, except the distance until nap time.

I announce that Mommy can’t take it anymore and needs to listen to some music. I pull up the Nichole Nordeman station on Pandora, over protests that they want Veggietales (which usually morphs into random and annoying other children’s songs like Barney and the Chipmunks).

The first song to come up is Legacy. I once danced to this song with the woman who mentored me as a dancer.  I fold laundry and the whining slowly fades away as the kids find other things to do, when it’s clear Mommy isn’t responding to any more desperate pleas for additional snacks or demands to help finding misplaced toys.

I ask myself what kind of legacy I am leaving. Will they remember that we read about snowflakes this morning or only that I couldn’t manifest a magnifying glass so that we could go outside the look at them like the last page of the book suggested?

Will they remember the cuddling, the love, the meals cooked, laundry washed and put away so that they have clean clothes to wear and food to fill their bellies with? (Man cannot live on Goldfish crackers alone).

As I ponder this, the song ends and the first strains of Gratitude begin to play. I know I will weep before the tears even begin to flow.

I look around at the floor covered with toys, the baskets full of clean laundry. I have so much compared to so many. I owe a debt of gratitude that will never be able to repay even in eternity. I could go on here, but instead I chose to let Nicole do the talking.