Moon

When I was pregnant with my first child, my husband and I lived on the island of St. Croix. One day while perusing books at a local shop, a woman started talking to me about motherhood. She didn’t offer up the usual advice most women do to first time moms, but she told me about one of the most beautiful things she’d witnessed as a mother. She told me about the children’s moon. I wasn’t sure what she was talking about at first, and she quickly explained how children so often notice the moon in the daytime it is known as the children’s moon. I wasn’t sure if I’d done the same thing as a child. She told me to wait and see.

I forgot about our conversation, and for the next year or two, I was your typical, full time sleep-deprived mom, just trying to keep my little one alive and find time to fit a shower in here and there. Then it happened. One day, before she was even speaking clearly, my toddler pointed to the sky and sure enough she was grinning and gesturing towards the moon, seen clearly in the daylight. At once, I remembered the conversation about the children’s moon.

Over the years, both of my daughters have pointed out the moon in the daytime so often, it has always made me smile. It makes me smile because they are so thrilled with the simple things, the things right in front of us. They don’t have to search for the secret to their happiness. It’s not some far-off goal, material item they have to have, or worldly success. They feel happy; they find happiness in the world around them and in the sky above. Sometimes I wish I could meet that lady again and thank her…

I’ve learned how to stop when I see the children’s moon now. For a moment, I forget the grown-up race, and my heart feels simply and undeniably happy. I smile at the children’s moon and wonder if just for a little while, it can be my moon. Who knows? Maybe it can be your moon, too.

~Sarah

Oh, and here is a link discussing some idea’s behind the origin of the term, “Children’s Moon” and an excerpt from the article:

http://earthsky.org/space/when-can-you-see-a-daytime-moon

“If you begin to look at the sky a lot, you’ll often see the daytime moon, too. Everyone loves to see the daytime moon. It’s beautiful and serene, floating against the blue sky. Once, a reader in Kansas City wrote in with the name children’s moon to describe a moon visible during the day. She said this name stemmed from the idea that children can’t stay up at night late enough to see the moon when it appears only in darkness.

That story prompted another reader to send in an alternate version for the origin of the name children’s moon. She wrote:

I heard a daytime moon was called a ‘children’s moon’ because their eyes were sharp enough to pick it out, where the old folks, with fading vision, could not tell it from the clouds.”