Hope personified.

You won't lose a thing to let yourself sink into everything you love right now. Your pillow, your family, the way the smallest things bring you delight and joy. To savor is to let gratitude in, and gratitude is a gateway to joy. What will you savor today, dreamer? - Mondo Beyondo Dream Lab, "Love Letter From the Universe."

I wanted to write something about gratitude after reading this letter from the universe, and after a perfectly (mostly) lovely day with my kids, the evening descended into one of our worse battles: Mad would not stop hitting, kicking, pinching, screaming. I actually tried spanking her even though time has proven this NEVER works, and of course it didn't. And so I gave up and just cried, right there in front of my 4-year-old daughter, begging her to tell me what pushes her to behave that way.

Of course she had no answer.

There was nothing I could do. So I let her cry herself to sleep, even after she begged me to stay and sobbed that she loves me and promised to never hit me. She's done this before. And the thing I hated most was that I looked into her deep brown eyes - they are fathomless, these eyes - and I felt....hopeless. This was the worst thing -- not that my hand was stinging in a failed attempt at control, not the guilt gnawing at me for even going there, not the hurt that I feel every time my firstborn lashes out at me that way -- the worst thing was that I looked into a face I used to gaze into when she was a tiny baby and see infinite possibility. Sweetness and joy, everything light and good in the world, right there on that small face. Hope personified.

And tonight, I felt hopeless.

So instead of focusing on gratitude, I want to remind myself that she is always something to celebrate. We are in a rough patch, and we have been for awhile, but this is the same little girl who after her bath tonight gathered four different nail polish colors and asked if I could use them all on her toes, who sat still and patient while I painted her toes blue, pink, red, orange and blue again, who delighted when I called them rainbow toes.

The same girl who chases grasshoppers with a dogged patience and is overcome with excitement when she sees lizards outside. Who also likes dresses and the color pink and coos to her kitten, "It's okay, I'm not upset with you," when the kitten does something naughty. Who is by all accounts a delicious and complicated girl. She is always something to celebrate, even after a night like tonight.

Listening: "I Know," Jude