January 28, 2011- Whirlwind!

     That’s what today felt like, a whirlwind! From work to lunch with the kids and back to work, then to the grocery store for necessities, and then cleaning the house up for preplanned dinner plans with a friend, it’s amazing how fast time can move when you are busy.  Tomorrow night signals the beginning of another weekend and the end of the first month of 2011.  My kids think an hour is like a lifetime, and I think the hours, and days, and months fly by like seconds, and 24 of those hours and days and months are over when they’ve barely just begun.  Why does time go by so much faster as you grow older? Is it because you know it’s coming to a close, that every minute that goes by is one less minute you’ll live your life, one minute closer to death?  I don’t think so because I’m not thinking about death that much yet...I’m too busy with life. 
     I know death is something my parents think about more now that they are older, but I am not quite there, yet time is already moving faster and faster. How do I stop it or slow it down at least? Tonight, I am slowing it down by recording it, so it can be lived over and over again, this very moment that you are reading about is the here and now and forever will be stuck on Jan. 28, 2011, so maybe that’s the key to the important moments every day. 
     This weekend, I will focus on the slowing down moments, reading to the kids before bed, chatting at the dinner table (as I know my youngest son eats dinner like the turtle running the race against the hare, slow and steady), and snuggling on the couch. That’s all I can do, right? Relish the moments as they come, enjoy them and make them stretch out as long as they can, realizing that they are not forever, and they are simply that, moments in time, memories to treasure, knowing that we cannot hold onto them. We have to let them pass, understanding that although the next moment may not be the same because our kids will be older, and life may be at a different stage, the current moments are no less important or special than the past ones. It’s all a part of the experience, the journey, and where would we be without the journey, stuck at the beginning and never knowing the end. The journey, or the middle, is the best part! It’s where all the meat is. It’s where life, peace, and lasting love resides, in the mundane middle, the heart of the sandwich and the heart of living.