Mommy Mates

"Next."

The abrupt voice interrupted the private concert that was going on in my head to Journey's "Open Arms" that was playing on the Post Office speaker system. 

I approached the desk with a big smile and friendly greeting. 

"What can I do for you?", came the emotionless question and response.

My friendly approach failed to break the doldrums of her day but as she weighed my package and asked me to verify that I wasn't sending bombs through the mail, her phone lit up and on the screen were five beautiful brown children. I don't know if it's socially acceptable to take a peek at someone's phone and then ask them about what you've seen but I went there.

"Are those your children?"

 She eagerly grabbed her phone and took it out of lock screen so she could show off her four handsome boys and their princess of a  baby sister and instantly the counter between us seemed to disappear and we were just two moms talking about Mom Life. I doted, she exuded pride. This is what moms do.

Then I told her that I have 8 children and with a gorgeous smile she said, "I feel like we're Mommy Mates." We laughed together (while other people in line probably grew impatient) and she want on... "You know, people see all my kids and they're like, oh my gosh! But you know because you're there."

Yes, I know. 
 We know. 

We know that while there may be things in our culture that separate us today, there are more things that bind us together. We share goals for our children, pride for who they are, insecurities as moms, and the desire for our children to grow up free from fear. We share because we're both raising humans. And we want our humans to grow up and be able to impact this world for the better.

When all of this black vs. blue vs. white is exploding in the streets around us, I'm reminded that we all have the same goals. We all want to live and to thrive. Unfortunately, we all don't have the same method for getting us to those goals and that's where it gets difficult. 

But today. 

Today it was easy. All it took was a smile and some story swapping. Some interest in others' lives and some tying of the heart strings. I know the big picture isn't nearly as simple as this but what if the big picture was made up of many thousands of pictures like this. What then?