A Little Prayer

New Year’s Day morning.
I got up a little earlier than usual and walked down the hill in front of our house.
My three-year-old son was swinging happily between my husband and I, holding each of our hands like a swing.

My breath was as white as a cotton candy, but the big orange sunrise bringed a warm glow.
In the pocket of my son’s down jacket, a New Year’s greeting card sat carefully. Erased over and over again with an eraser, it was written on New Year’s Eve for his beloved grandfather and grandmother.
The colorful portraits of his grandparents written with colored pencils were lined with the words he practiced hard, “Let’s play a lot this year,” he wrote.

When I arrived at the mailbox in front of the store at the bottom of the hill, my son carefully took out a postcard from his pocket.
He asked, “I’ll put the letter in my own mailbox!”
I picked up my son, who was begging me to put the postcard in his pocket. I slowly checked that the postcard is sucked into the mouth of the mailbox, and then gently lower him to the ground.

As I was about to leave for home, my son would not leave the front of the mailbox. When I peeked in to see why, I found him holding his hands together in prayer toward the red postbox.
The sight of him was both cute and serious,
I asked him softly from behind, “Are you praying to the post?”
I asked him softly from behind.
He answered, “I was praying that the handwritten letter would be delivered properly.”
I was impressed by his small wish.

My husband’s large hand gently stroked our son’s chestnut hair.
The three of us walked up the hill to our house, hand in hand again.
As I looked at my son’s slightly more mature profile, I promised myself that I would cherish the small wishes and thanksgivings I received each day.