Weep Not For The Memories

"Is this the little girl I carried?

Is this the little boy at play?

I don't remember growing older

When, did, they?

When did she get to be a beauty?

When did he grow to be so tall?

Wasn't it yesterday when they, were, small?"

--Fiddler on the Roof, Lewis Bock Jerrold / Sheldon Harnick

Time flies right? One second you're tooling around in a minivan stocked with juice boxes and baby seats and then next you're shopping for a prom dress. It can seem that way, but it's not. An hour is sixty minutes, and a day is twenty-four hours; those are hard numbers. Memories are different. While there is a science to the brain, how memories are formed, what we forget and what we remember, there is also an intangible part of remembering the past that seems to warp our perception of the passage of time.

My three children are not little anymore. The boys, at 27 and 20, are legit grownups. Despite their occasional idiot moments, they are good guys, who are doing well on their own. Does it seem like "just yesterday" that Andy was toddling around the backyard in the kiddy pool? Am I shocked when a full-sized human, driving a souped-up Ford Mustang, roars into my driveway and I realize that it's George behind the wheel? Um…no, not so much. Do I sit wistfully by while they go about their independent lives and wish they were back in my living room, eating on the couch and watching SpongeBob? Nope. Does that make me some hard-hearted detached mother? No way, because they might be grown, but if they were in danger or needed me, that Momma bear instinct would still kick in.

My youngest isn't quite there yet, she's still in high school, still bopping around with her friends, whining a fair amount, and handing me her laundry, but she's getting close to being independent too, and rather than crying in my beer about it, I think it's pretty phenomenal. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but these creatures were yanked from my body, bloody and screaming, and all these years later they are still here. There have been times when I couldn't get a loaf of bread and a carton of eggs home from the store without making a mess of it, and these kids got this far with me as their mom? Who'd a thunk it? It's not sad though, at least not to me.

Looking at baby pictures always makes me laugh. In our house, we usually preferred snapshots and candids over posed photos. Thank goodness for digital cameras; you can take fifty pictures and get one or two good ones without having to waste rolls and rolls of film. It was incredibly tempting to send one of the "bad" pictures from my lame attempt at a photo shoot for the family Christmas card. Eventually, after much wailing and gnashing of teeth, we got a picture that was fine, but not like the perfect matching sweater and Santa hat photos other families had. The kids were eleven, four and fourteen months. My oldest had his eyes closed, Devin was beet red and screaming, her hair matted with sweat and Oreo crumbs and George was smirking and had his fingers up his nose. It's the off moments like this that I'm glad are captured because it reminds me that it's a good thing we have all come this far. Those days of drowning in applesauce and baby juice were not quite as idyllic as the foggy lens of nostalgia would have us believe.

Just this week my daughter had a few events where she had to look professional, speak publicly, and interact with adults. She was, if I may say so, nothing short of spectacular. Definitely a biased opinion, but shouldn't every parent feel that way when their child does something well? Did it make me weep for the days of dollhouses and Dora the Explorer? Not even a little; it was thrilling. When the kids are little, everyone tells you to enjoy it while it lasts. Ok, well, what about now? Shouldn't we appreciate this time too? It's not an ending, it's some kind of middle ground, but that's how it's supposed to be. There's a lot more to come too, but if we are mired in memories and yesterdays, we're going to miss it. The younger years are not the only ones that go by fast. Lose the tissues, grab the camera and catch these moments; they too will fly by. Save all the pictures, even the bad ones, your grandchildren will love them.