Perspective

Every now and then I have a moment where twelve things dawn on me all at once - today is one of those days...

Days come and days go, years pass by with us hardly knowing. We are in a society where the finer things in life take a sort of back seat to the duties we must adhere to. Bills need to get paid, kids need to be fed, dishes washed, clothes cleaned, toys picked up, and on and on and on. Days turn to weeks, turn to months, turn to years - all of a sudden you're in a place and you don't know how you got there.

Today, my mother is 46 and somehow - this is shocking to me. I know how time works, and I know how old she was when I was born. l of these things. It all boils down to simple math. It's not difficult, but still - what the hell happened. My son will be 4 this year, I've been living in my apartment for a year and a half already. My little sister recently turned 10, my little brother will be 15, and I wonder where the time has gone. I remember them both being in diapers, and now they're all grown up (sort of).

There was a time when 30 seemed 'old', when 40 was just silly talk. Yet, here I am, zeroing in on that very number. Yes, I'm still a little ways off, but who knows - I could wake up, what feels like tomorrow and have it already be upon me. Will I have achieved what I wanted to? Will I have done the things that I keep pushing to "tomorrow" or "later"? Or will "later" come and just be too late.

I am trying to cherish the small things, trying to take all of the pictures, trying to be there for all of the major events in my little boys' life. Yet, I'm afraid that I'm going to realize that all of the things passed me by, and that I'm too late. I don't want to be the person standing on the street, watching her life going on through the open window.

I want to be in there living it.

 

"I'm in the moment
The one where nothing matters
And everything's alright
I'm seeing things so clearly now
And you're the reason why
I'm in the moment
And I'm alive
I'm alive"

Living in the moment is how it should be. Being grateful for stuffed air pancakes my baby made for me in his play kitchen, even though the living room looks like a tornado ripped through it. Cheering him on for making cupcakes out of bath bubbles, not being upset that he splashed water all over the floor while doing it. I've got better things to do now than to be upset by things that can be fixed. Messes can be picked up, and water dries - why stress.

“In ordinary life we hardly realize that we receive a great deal more than we give, and that it is only with gratitude that life becomes rich.”

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer