Two little words have been my strategy for a long time. When kids were wiggly in a long line at the grocery store, or the car ride was tedious, or a pair of siblings were tussling over the ball, I used them. 

"I spy..."

My children's attention bounced away from the wait or the disagreement toward finding a particular color. 

"...with my little eye, something red."

It was as easy as that. Of course, it didn't last into middle school. But for little ones it smoothed those awkward transitions that are an inevitable component of life in a world that cannot, and I would argue should not, revolve around a three year old's attention span. 

It turns out that such diversions have not gone out of style. Today my granddaughter was itchy to leave the table before she had eaten as much of her lunch as her mother would prefer, so I pulled those words out of retirement. Olly's impatience pivoted. She looked around the room for something pink, long enough to scoop up a few more bites. In a blink her desire to get down became less important than the hunt. 

What makes me laugh, is the peripheral awareness that God uses the strategy with me. The other day, I was feeling restless about something John was telling me. I wanted to stand up and finish a quilt top I was working on, but just then our daughter sent a group message asking for anyone who was free to cheer up her son. I clicked on the call, and John and I joined a few doting family members in three countries as we made a collective montage of smiling faces. In that brief recalibration, I let go of my annoyance with John, in the sweeter effort to connect with our grandson. 

Sometimes I am as leadable as a small child. Plus my attention span does not guide the universe.