Luke 2:19  But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. (NIV)

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Our four-year-old granddaughter spent the night with us. I spent the afternoon playing with her younger sister. We two worked our way through a box of tissues. She has the runniest of runny noses. 

My bride picked up the four-year-old from her preschool and took her to a trampoline park. We gathered at home and enjoyed a fresh, hot, made-to-order pizza, and a hot dog. 

Hot dogs are not part of our regular menu. In fact, I don’t remember the last time I had a hot dog. I typically have about one a year when forced to do so in someone’s backyard. My bride made a special trip to the grocery store to find an acceptable hot dog made the right way. 

We had a wonderful dinner of pizza, hot dog, and raw vegetables, and a dessert of blueberries for our granddaughter. We laughed, talked, and had such a wonderful time. We watched the first part of the movie Despicable Me 2. My bride and our granddaughter decided they wanted to turn in early. 

I enjoyed a productive evening reviewing material that had been languishing for too long, in preparation for material I need for a special project. 

This led to the beginning of a long chain of events that kept us up most of the night. Our granddaughter decided to sleep in our bed with my wife, while I was relegated to the guest bedroom upstairs. Our precious baby girl, however, became ill and threw up on my side of the bed. 

We cleaned her up and got her back to sleep. Then the process began again. And again. And again. And again. 

Around two AM, I told our wonderfully pleasant little munchkin about an evening when her mother was about her size and had a similar experience. We were up for over two hours straight that night washing sheets, drying sheets, and putting those sheets back on the bed because we had to wash the replacement sheets and dry them. She thought that was pretty funny. 

She asked me for more stories about her mother, and I told her more. And since I had taken the cleanup shift until 2:30, I toddled upstairs to the guest bedroom and got a good, solid two-and-a-half hours of sleep. 

It’s amazing what happens when you reach a certain age and, for ages past, you have gotten up at the same time just about every day. Your body thinks you have to get up then, even if you only got two-and-a-half hours of sleep. And so I did. The first thing I did was check on the baby girl to see how she was feeling. Her grandmother told me they had been up several more times in the early morning with the same unpleasant experience. 

We are all going to need a nap today. 

We had plans to do some fun stuff, but fun looks a lot different when you haven’t slept. 

These memories are precious. The memories of what happened that night long ago with our granddaughter’s mother came in handy at two o’clock in the morning. Our granddaughter learned that experiences like last night, though rare, are normal. 

She never cried. She was wonderfully pleasant through it all. Her hugs were warm. Her soft voice was angelic. She patiently endured changing sheets, changing clothes, and all the other things that come with being up all night. 

Even the most indelicate experiences can create memories that remind us what matters most. What matters most in this situation is not the lack of sleep, but the depth of devotion for someone who has somehow made you love them so much. 

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I will treasure these memories that remind me of what love is and does. 

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Our Father, thank you. Just when I thought I couldn’t love that little girl anymore, I learned all new lessons of devotion. I gained all new memories of tender affection. I embraced a little bit of heaven. Amen.