It's Not the Years, It's the Miles

I was standing in line with my daughter, checking out today. I had given in, possibly foolishly, and bought her a new book. I say foolishly for two reasons, a) I have this book on my kindle, but am disinclined to hand over my ipad after seeing how she treats her own electronics and b) she has a lot of studying to do and I know that book will sing its siren call to her. But, whether it is foolish or not, I bought her the book. She told afterward that a good friend had read the same book recently and an adult was shocked that someone their age would want to read said book, because they couldn't possibly understand it at their age. Katie asked me, knowing I had already read this book, whether or not this was true. I answered as truthfully as I could:

Read this book now, and you'll enjoy it, and you'll get a lot out of it. Read it again in ten years, and you'll get a lot more out of it.

I find this to be true over and over in my own life. Rereading the books of my childhood is a great pleasure, because it's getting to know an old friend all over again, and finding out new and fascinating things they had never revealed to you before. Reading books means bringing in your own life experiences, and the older I get, the more experiences I can bring to the table.

My brother is fond of saying that I was born an old lady, and have learned to embrace childhood as an adult. He's probably right. I was too busy learning Algebra at six to have much time left for making childhood memories. My parents did what they thought was right for me, and they embraced the old lady they'd been given, never realizing the value in the rites of childhood and all the life experiences they bring to the party going on in the brain. But the memories I do have of doing foolish children's activities are some of my best memories ever. Books were my window to the wider world, and inspired some of my best adventures.

After reading Huckleberry Finn, a friend and I once built a raft and floated it down part of the Cahaba River. Wish I'd remembered I couldn't swim before we pushed off from shore. But I lived through it. I started my own Pickwick Portfolio after reading Jo's adventures in Little Women. Encyclopedia Brown taught me that there wasn't a mystery that I couldn't solve with a little ingenuity and some dusting powder. Too bad the powder from my mom's make-up drawer wasn't such a good substitute. I ran away from home once with clothes tied to a stick. Yeah, that was pretty stupid. It might have been related to the dusting powder incident, come to think of it.

Yet, all of those misadventures contributed to the person I am today. So did the less planned adventures: friends who died, my first drinking binge, my first disastrous relationship, moving thirteen times in sixteen years, parties on the lake and smoking in a friend's basement, getting married, falling in love and falling out of love, having children, manning up and fixing my own problems, and a whole lot of sobbing in between.

So, I revisit a favorite childhood book, and all of the baggage, all that messy crap, it comes with me and crawls back into the pages of the story with me. I see more of the characters, and I understand them a little better. Sometimes I think now, "god you're such an idiot, don't be nice, just chop his freaking head off!" Altruistic acts often seem a lot less romantic to me these days, because they seem to come back to bite more than just storybook characters in the butt.

I can't say it's because I'm crawling through the fourth decade of my life that I have these experiences - I learned some pretty difficult lessons pretty early on. And I don't think much of chronological age these days - I can have a great conversation with my teenage daughter, or my septuagenarian friend. Sometimes what we have in common is an experience, and sometimes that's what we admire about one another.

I encourage my kids to read what they can, whenever they can (well, as long as they keep up their school work). Get what they can from the books now, plan to visit again later. But keep their eyes open for the real experiences happening outside the pages of a book as well. It's the miles we put on that really make the stories worthwhile.

2012: Not as Ominous as it Sounds

So, it's a brand-new year. 2012. Foretold by some as the year the world will end. Not going to worry about that, as the world will end when it ends, and nothing I do will change that in one way or another. Yes, I'm all about saving our planet, but I meant by recycling. Giant catastrophe? All I've got to offer is prayer. So, moving on to celebrate a new year, and not to worry about what might or might not happen. Disaster can strike ANY year. And no one can predict what will happen with any degree of certainty. 2011 was full of enough tragedy, thank you very much, all around the world. It was full of moments of loss, and full of moments of joy. Just the way that life is meant to be. Without the one, we can't appreciate the true beauty of the other.

2011, when I lost old friends and said goodbye to some people I loved. The year I reminded myself that sometimes doing the right thing means hurting someone you care about, and then forced myself to do it anyway. The year I started to realize how painful the letting go part of parenting can be - and how badly I suck at that part. The year I reminded myself that I'm not as smart as I think I am, about 99.9% of the time.

It was also the year I realized how right my grandmother was - the older you get, the faster time flies by. When I was younger, I wished time to fly. I wished away hours, days and months. Now I just wish for them to stretch out a little longer, to enjoy just a few more hours every day of having children at home, a job that I generally enjoy, a memory that hasn't failed completely yet, nor eyesight that plays tricks on me.

Time. As the New Year begins, I know some of what lies ahead. Katie will leave St. Francis, where she has spent her entire life, and move on to high school. No longer riding in with me every day, but more independent and growing up, just as is intended. Elizabeth will move into Middle School life - sports, dances, parties and social heartbreak. My work has changed, and I stand on the precipice of creating something new - it's exciting and scary all at the same time. I've spent three years laying the groundwork, and I'm about to watch it all start to unfold. Success or failure - it will all fall on me. Scares the crap out of me sometimes. Time will fly by faster and faster.

I'll watch another 8th grade class graduate, and this year when I cry, it will be all the more for my own child and for the first class I taught full-time. Sixteen of those 84 kids started in my preschool classroom. Sometimes I want to smack some of them, because I've known them their entire lives and they're acting like idiots. Most of the time, I'm so incredibly proud of the people they have become.

As one group exits, I'll watch another group start school for the first time. New faces to learn, new smiles to know and same old problems every year, that all kids have in common. I will apply bandaids, break up fights, chase down crying girls in bathrooms, and at some point will threaten to glue at least one little boy to a chair if he doesn't sit down and leave his neighbor alone. The familiar comfort of knowing that children are the same no matter what else happens and changes in this fast-paced world.

It will be conflicting as I watch my children grow older and wiser, and my parents grow another year older and well...just older and smaller.

What does a year hold? Oh, about 220 days of work. About 330 dinners cooked. 50 dance classes. 100 runs to gymnastics class. Soccer games, volleyball matches, dance recitals, plays, choir performances, parties, sleepovers, and last minute study sessions. Weekly bouts of tears, from both the kids and from me.

I will hire new part-time employees, and watch others move on to better options. It'll irritate me for a moment, because I'm left in the lurch, and then I'm satisfied knowing I helped a young teacher find a promising position or a new graduate find their place in a bigger world. I don't just nurture the students, but also my part-time instructors. It's nice to know I've helped some of them find the right path. I've probably helped a few of them onto the wrong path as well, but they're nice enough not to come back and point that out.

I will clean my house too many times to count, but it'll never be often (or thorough) enough. C'est la vie. I will put 10,000 miles on my car. I will drink over 10,000 ounces of diet coke, and I will say that I should break this addiction, but probably won't. And I'm not too worried about it. I will see at least 20 movies, and will have at least 30 more I never made the time to see. I will TeeVo hours of television I never make time to watch.

I don't make resolutions - the above are just observations based on past history. What I will promise to myself is that I will try harder, laugh more, and really, really, really try to hold my criticism when talking to my irrational adolescent children. I will love with complete abandon, because those I love can be gone from my life for myriad reasons, with no warning. 2011 showed me that. I will try to praise those around me more - the hardest thing of all. I don't like being praised, so it's hard for me to remember that other people DO like it. And I will learn at least three new things this year. They don't have to be big things, just three new things. Because the day I stop learning, is the day I stop living.

Time will continue to march on - what I make of it is my responsibility. Joy or disaster, it's up to me to make the most of what I get.

Happy New Year.