Last week, Lansing had their annual “light up downtown” for Christmas event.  There was a parade in the dark, the lighting of the tree in front of the capitol, and fireworks, as well as a number of little things around town, like live reindeer and pictures with Santa and a 5K race.  A friend and I had decided to go down for the parade and fireworks, and we got there plenty early so that we could have good standing positions to see.  There were already people five or six rows deep by the time we got there, but we found a fairly decent spot close to the capitol and settled in for the parade.  A little while passed and a mom with her son in a stroller came up behind us.  The boy had cerebral palsy, as we later learned, and we let him and his mom and grandfather in front of us so that he could see better.   The woman was a chatter, and we got her life story and then some as we stood there waiting for the parade, which I didn’t mind.  As the parade started, people started to gather round and push in closer.  A mom with her two young kids (a boy probably 9 and a girl probably 7) came up behind us and the kids started complaining that they couldn’t see.  We let them in front of us so that they could see, and I started telling the little girl what was coming because I could see over her head.  Eventually she got tired of standing, and went back to her mom and asked her to put her on her shoulders.  Her mother said no, and the little girl went back to her spot where she had been watching.  I leaned down and asked her if she wanted to sit on my shoulders so that she could see better.  Her eyes lit up and she nodded, and climbed up onto my shoulders.  Before, she hadn’t said a word to me, and now, she was the one telling me what was coming.  Now she couldn’t stop talking!  Before the parade was over, their mom said they had to go, and the little girl climbed down and said thanks.

It’s small, but this event reminded me that sometimes, we can see what’s coming down the road before it gets to us, and we’re ready for what gets thrown our way.  But other times, we have to rely on someone else to tell us what’s coming, and we get an incomplete picture of what is coming our way.  Other times, we just have to wait until the events cross our paths, and as much as we’d like to, we don’t know what’s coming.

I’d like to know what’s going to happen in my life and when, but that’s not the way it works.  I don’t even know what’s going to happen tomorrow, but sometimes I get a glimpse of the future through the eyes of a child.  I just have to be willing to listen.