On Counting

From cars, to rocks, to community

We brought our first baby home to a duplex in the bustling center of Sacramento’s grid. We didn’t know any of our neighbors, but there was never a shortage of activity passing by and, to feel less lonely during those early days of motherhood, I would open our front door to let in the humming noise of the city. As that baby grew into a toddler, we would sit together at our open front door and count the stream of cars driving down our street.

One red car…

Two red cars…

One blue car with the window down…

One white truck with a dog in the back…

Not long after, we moved with that toddler to our current home—tucked into the far eastern part of our city, on about as quiet and suburban of a street as you can get with an urban Sacramento zip code. Unaccustomed to the lack of noise, my daughter would pull me to the front door and sigh deeply at the empty street with no cars driving past. Thrilled with finally having a safe, traffic-less street to meander down, and new neighbors to meet, I would take her outside and show her there were other things to count besides cars.

One, two, three rocks in the neighbor’s front yard…

One bush with pink flowers…

One tree…

Two big rocks next to one tree…

One neighbor that we can introduce ourselves to as she gardens…

We’ve lived in our house for eight years now, and walks with my kids around our neighborhood are still a frequent occurrence. But these days, instead of rocks and trees, I count something different.

One, two, three houses to the right, to find our dear friends—the ones we celebrate Easter with and who pick our kids up from school when we can’t…

One, two houses to the left, to the women I wave to when I see them walking their dogs in the evening. The same women I give free reign over my zinnia patch, an open invitation to cut flowers whenever they want, who generously returned that invitation with a gift certificate to their favorite neighborhood pizza place…

One house with a tree fort in the front yard, the one where all the neighborhood children love to play. These are the neighbors who (twice!) ran down to our house at a moment’s notice when I went into labor earlier than expected…

One neighbor who gives the kids popsicles and other treats when she sees us walk by…

20 steps across the street to the neighbors who bring us produce from their garden and swap flower seeds with me every spring…

11 houses on our street where I know the residents by their first names…

And I say a prayer of thanks that where I could once only count objects, I can now count community.

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This post is a part of the blog tour for Small Steps: Blessings to Lift Your Soul on the Pilgrimage of Life. Small Steps is a book of blessings meant to meet us in our daily lives, in all of the challenges and joys, struggles and triumphs. A few of the blessings include: For a Rough Morning, Listening to a Dream, Learning to Pray Again, and For an Ordinary Tuesday. Order your copy wherever books are sold. Small Steps by Kimberly Knowle - Zeller releases May 5th!¹

1. May 5th is my birthday, and I’m considering my pre-ordered copy a birthday present to myself. If you want to celebrate my birthday with me, maybe pre-order a copy for yourself? ;)