booandbunny

My days are filled with kissing. These kisses are a blessing I not only fail to count, but one I fail to think of counting. They come in so many shapes and flavors and sizes how can they all possibly be classified with the same word? And it’s such a small word.

Kiss

The smallest of words seem to carry the most in our lives. Sometimes I think brevity bolsters their power.


And so I wander through my days, kissing. As the kids get older there are fewer kisses to collect, but I collect them nonetheless. "Mama needs at least a thousand kisses a day or she will grow weak and start to shrivel." That is what I used to tell them when they were smaller. They would pile on me and pour out giggles and kisses and I would drink it in as so much nectar from the gods.

Now, like Santa Claus, I have to fight to keep their faith in me. The power of reason is a little thief, I think, pocketing our innate openness and replacing it with, well, guarded expression. But I still collect their kisses. Three in the morning, three before they leave for school and many many more each night when I tuck them in. "I love you, Mommy," they say each night. And so I drink some more.

But it’s this time of day when kissing changes. When their rooms are dark; their dreams are in high gear; their doors are closed to the rest of the world ... that is when the Baskin Robbins’ world of this tiny little word opens up for me. Sometimes we’re both in the mood. Sometimes only one. Sometimes an open bottle changes the flavor of the encounter. Sometimes there’s a little coaxing, the kind of lingering that closes us off from the outside world, pushes the power of reason from our pockets and fills us with fairy dust. Sometimes one needs taken care of, reassured. Sometimes there’s only enough energy for the obligatory peck, no anger or malice or negativity, only fatigue. So many shapes this kissing takes. But this kissing, His kisses, they have filled my days for half a lifetime. They are a sweet shop of expression whose language is mine alone.

I’ve kept my Scribblings to myself for far too long. It feels so good to be kissing the world with words again! For more on this and other prompts, visit Sunday Scribblings.