Rocking with Momma

"Mom, do we have to pray the rosary? It's just the same thing over and over. It's so boooorrring."

I know you will all be disappointed to know that the same child who "figured out life" when she was five and realized that Jesus is the Good Shepherd and we are the sheep, asked me this question this week at ten years old. I find it consoling that she is able to be honest with her momma and call it as she sees it. Prayer is boring sometimes. Why should we pray the rosary?

We were driving down Keo Way in Des Moines and had just finished the fourth decade of the sorrowful mysteries. I was having a somewhat difficult day emotionally and was totally melting into this prayer, so her question brought me up short. Suddenly I had an image that I thought might help.

"Do you remember when you were young and would climb up on my lap?"

"Yes," she replied.

"Well," I began, "what if I put you up on my lap, held you close, and rocked you back and forth and set you back down? Would that have been enough? Or would you rather have rocked with me for longer? What would you have done if I just set you right back down?"

"Longer. If you just set me down, I would want you to pick me up again."

"It wouldn't be too repetitive to just rock back and forth for 20 minutes with your mamma?"

"Of course not," she chuckles.

"I think for me, the rosary is like sitting on Mary's lap and rocking back and forth and back and forth. She tells me soft stories about Jesus, maybe what happened the day he died. Maybe she tells about the great day he rose and of how he honored her with a crown in heaven. She holds me in her arms as we rock back and forth and think about Jesus together. She tells me how much she loves him, and I love him, too."

We didn't finish our fifth decade before I dropped her off for school that morning, but I could see the wheels spinning in her head. Maybe on her own she'll climb up and rock on her Mamma Mary's lap before the day is through.