We asked my friends, her parents, and they nodded: twenty minutes until supper, and the sun slipping down toward a hundred bays and bayous.
Out the door, across the road, under a quarter moon. "There's Venus," she said, pointing above the pines. My little hound leaped toward the bright planet, straining at the leash.
"Let's run!" and off we romped, careening across the field, toward the tree line, then back again, to the edge of the creek, running faster even as the light faded.
"Hello!" she called up the loving planet, as though inviting the wandering star to run with us. We circled and ran and galloped until we tumbled to the grass, even the puppy panting to stop.
"It is good to sit on the grass and look upon the moon," she said. "It's good," I said.
"Teach me something," I said, and so she told me about the planets (how one is tilted, how early observers thought this one was a comet), and about the moon that changes with such constancy.
Before going inside, we took one more run, round the trees in a crazy orbit, and then I took her home.
If you are weary, go run with a six-year-old who has braids down her back and stars in her eyes. Go, take the hound and leave the work and romp under the waxing moon. Laugh in the cold air until your lungs hurt. Then take the child home, promise to come back with a new story to read, and turn toward your own house.
Remember, as you walk, that this this is advent, season of hope, and of peace, and of waiting. Ponder what it means to wait, and wonder what it is your heart hopes to see. Look up. Find that planet "kindling love in man," and smile to see she's running home with you.
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