Can I have this dance?

Scooping up your baby and dancing around the living room can be one of life's little pleasures.  I've long since forgotten how many times I did that as a young mother, but I can tell you that dancing with my children happened a lot.  

We'd put on our favourite CD's and
spin and twirl,
put our right hand in and put our right hand out,
dip and sway,
groove to the silly ones,
dance slowly to the restful ones.

Fast forward a few years and the children are in elementary school and have stopped dancing with mom, but my oldest could still be seen dancing and singing around the house on his own.  My daughter was well into her dancing endeavours with tap, jazz, and ballet lessons.  But my middle son has abandoned dancing in favour of other activities - like comic books, and playing with friends.

This week was a big occasion in our house - my middle son, Colson, had his high school graduation.  Monday was the commencement and Friday was the dinner.  How amazing it is to see your "babies" grow up and become ready for taking on the adventure of adulthood.  At the dinner last night, my son's former grade two teacher was there with her own graduate and we had a few moments to reminisce about all those years ago.

I had mentioned to my son earlier in the week that there is always a mother/son or father/daughter dance at the grad, and I was hoping to dance with him.  I could tell he was a little (OK, quite a lot) uncomfortable with the idea as this would involve letting down his don't-touch-me "forcefield".  But I just mentioned it the one time.  As we were enjoying the dinner and the various toasts and awards, I was wondering about the upcoming moment...

Of course, even though the grads come with their parents, they do roam around and connect with their friends at other tables.  As the MC was announcing that the parent/grad dance was about to begin I saw that  my son was  - no where to be seen.  So I got out my phone to text him - and as I looked up for a moment -  there he was - holding out his hand to me to come dance.


There are moments 
that stay with a mother for the rest of her life.


This will be one of them