and rain will make the flowers grow

Maybe I can't have it all.  Or perhaps I just can't have it all the time. 

That's what I've been wondering about lately.  Sometimes I get a little down about the quarrelsome moments.  I want us to be happy all the time.  I want patience and sisterly kindness 24/7.  Happiness, giggles, and hearts full o' love around the clock.

But I'm thinking that's not real.  

When I was younger, I used to love to listen to the music of Les Miserables.  Just now I remembered one of my favorite songs, although not one of the more famous ones.  I used to play it on the piano and sing it to myself because I loved the words- I loved the message.  The name of the song is "A Little Fall of Rain", and is sung by Eponine and Marius just before Eponine dies.  The whole song is beautiful, but this morning for some reason I thought of the line where she tells him, ". . .And rain will make the flowers grow". 

I've been thinking along those lines the past few days, but hadn't quite thought of it that way.  I've been pondering how families grow.  It seems that the past few months have been pretty sunshiney.  (Not outside, of course- just inside our little abode).  I've noticed this trend before.  Sunshine, blue skies. . .all is well.  I should know by now that blue skies can't go on forever.  Always, always there will come a little rain.  The clouds will gather, people will feel a little stormy, and a few tear drops will fall.  It just seems to be the way of things. 

But rain will make the flowers grow, wont it?

It will rain for a bit, the clouds will hover for a while, and all of us will hopefully dig our roots a little deeper to weather the storm.  The weather report holds nothing life-threatening, of course.  Just the typical showers and fleeting bursts of bad weather that come as children grow and stretch and parents struggle to adapt and fulfill those needs.  And then, before we know it?  We'll have weathered the rainy season, skies will brighten, and in it's wake we'll be left a little stronger for having toughed it all out. 

'Til the next storm arrives, anyway.  That seems to be the way it works in our garden anyhow.  In the meantime we'll pull the weeds that will certainly come with all this rain, fertilize a bit with some extra love, and wait to see the fruits of our labor.  I'll try not to fret about the dark clouds or the strong winds that threaten to uproot us.  I'll continue to strive and hope that I create sunshine enough that my little plantings won't wither away.  I'll strive to place more attention on the growth than on the struggle.  The sunshine instead of the storm.  And I'll remember. 

Rain will make our flowers grow.