I was driving in the car with my mother the other day and she said:
“I just now feel like I could be in my thirties.”
My sister and I have always joked that my mom thinks she is a teenager. She is young at heart, despite her body telling her otherwise. At thirty-one, I am starting to identify with what she has been telling us all these years. Time may dictate that we get older, but that doesn’t mean we have to feel older. If it wasn’t for the responsibility that has followed me down the brick road to marriage, homeownership, and motherhood, I would still feel like I was in my early twenties. The fact that I can even write this as if I am not ACTUALLY still twenty is flabbergasting.
I have always believed age to be nothing more than a number, but now I am living it as truth. Our mindset is what dictates the illusive timeline of our lives. We hold the power more than we realize. As I witness the development of my children, I find myself reflecting on my life and the moments that I wish I would’ve been more present. As a society, we are always on the go, but last night I was sitting on the couch with Brooks while he watched Batman, and time seemingly stopped.
Night had fallen around us, and the wind picked up as a large storm swept through the area. The trees were dancing while the thunder and lightning put on a show. All the while, I was sitting cuddled up with my little Brooksie, David and Jethro in the dining room doing yet another puzzle. It was way past bedtime, need not mention bathtime, but it didn’t matter. We were enjoying the moment. Simply being with one another. Bath time and bedtime, inevitable yet inconsequential.
We get wrapped up in our daily chores and the grind that is life, all too often. But these moments, the ones where you can just be still, look in your babies eyes and think, I created you, in absolute astonishment – just like I did last night – are priceless. One day – God-willing- I am going to open my eyes, slowly get out of bed, and wonder where my babies went. They will be in their own homes, maybe even married with babies of their own. That is par for the course. Growing older is not something to dread, it is a privilege afforded to us by a life well lived. We need to thank our lucky stars EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. for simply waking up a day older and hopefully, wiser.
At some point in our lives, we let the flame inside our hearts extinguish, getting wrapped up in the mundane and focused on anything and everything that can be burdensome. Children, on the other hand, live lives full of magic. Remember your imaginary brother? I do. I used to reprimand him all the time. HAHA My kids spend hours playing with their imagination. Half the time Brooks is Batman, and Jethro is Superman. To them, I am Wonder Woman and David is Flash. You can’t help but love the innocence enkindled at their core and their desire to be inventive. As far as they are concerned, the sky is the limit and there is nothing holding them back from being everything they hunger to be and more. As years pass, sometimes that magic sticks with us and other times it dissipates, regardless, we all have it inside. If we can keep this in mind as a token of our youth, maybe we can stay kids forever.
