I took a minute today ….

Just a minute. I’ll be there in a minute. I just need one minute. Gimme a minute. Hang on just a minute.
I say that all too often. Especially, I think, to my 8-year-old most precious child. He is actually very patient, for an 8-year-old. It hit me how often I say that yesterday when I’d gone outside to jump with him on his newly set up trampoline. He has no siblings, so I am a stand-in playmate a lot. And not a very good one, I’m afraid, though I try. He shows me things he’s drawn and wants me to draw with him. I do … after a minute (or more) finishing up a load of laundry. He wants to go outside and play football. I go … after a minute (or ten) finishing loading the dishwasher. He wants to create paper airplanes, or have nerf gun battles, or build something with legos. He wants me to do these things with him. And I do … after a minute (or twenty) getting supper started or finishing work.
So yesterday, we went outside in the face- melting Arkansas heat to jump on the trampoline. He got right up and started jumping. I sat on a chair in the shade to finish a couple things I’d neglected during the day.
“C’mon mom!”
I was on the phone checking on my parents that I hadn’t called the night before. “Just a sec.” I ended that call.
He jumped around and then, “Mom, you bout ready?”
I was setting up a doctor’s appointment. “Just a minute.”
I finished that call and texted someone back about a project I’m working on.
“You coming?” He stood still for a brief second to see if I was getting out of the chair in the shade yet.
“Yep, just finishing this up.” I ended the text.
I looked up and he was was standing, waiting – patiently – on me.
I felt guilty for making him wait so long. (5 minutes, not 1)
Now I believe in letting him play alone so he learns how not to depend on others for entertainment. I don’t overschedule his life so that he can play. But he needs interaction too. And he wanted me right then.
So I hopped up on that trampoline and jumped with him. We played Crack the Egg and I showed him what my old P.E. teacher used to make us do on the old trampoline in the gym. He tried to do those tricks. (Super hard stuff like jumping high enough to land in a seated position and then pop back up on straight legs. I was almost able to do it!) We took turns sitting cross legged and letting the other one try to bounce us in the air. We held hands and jumped together to see how high we could go until we collapsed laughing on the trampoline. (He at me because I’m not coordinated anymore and make quite a spectacle and me at his beautiful laughing face.)
He laid on my arm and said, “You’re the best mom in the whole world!”
“Your the best kid in the whole world!” I said because he is.
I was the best mom to him because I’d taken time to jump, to play … with him.
He laid on my arm and we stared up at the sky trying to imagine cooler weather and talking about how nice it would be in the fall to just lay here and watch leaves fall.
And we will. Because I’m going to take a minute. Just a minute – a little more often.