in-between

What I'm listening to: Stable Song by Gregory Alan Isokov

I don't need to tell you that the older you get, the faster the years go by. I am left breathless by them, all at once dazzled and frightened by time. The other day Austen said, "I can't wait until Wilder can crawl!" and I replied, "But we don't want to wish away the time we have now, because he'll never be this little again. Just like we'll never hold tiny, 6-pound Wilder again, we'll never again have a chance to enjoy him as a little 3-month-old who needs to be carried everywhere and can't roll over or crawl yet. He'll never be this small again!" I could see the recognition of that truth in her eyes. (Just a few days later, he started rolling over like a pro.)

So it's with this lens that I've been perceiving our days lately. Knowing that in a blink (one blink is approximately ten years - I know this because I have had a 10-year-old and will have another by the years' end, so I am an expert at blinks) I will have two adult children. I remember when my sister Sky was a baby, I would take the ten years between us and come up with a timeline in my head, complete with little embellishments: someday I'll be 22 and Sky will be 12 - maybe I'll be a mommy. We will go shopping together and I'll help her do her hair. And just like that, it happened. In a single blink.

At times I consider Charlotte Mason's words that children are born "whole persons," and I wonder at the little humans my babies are, the memories they will hold someday as adults. I know I feel the same as I did as a child, some of my memories feeling existing as vividly as what I wore yesterday, or just as significant as how I feel presently, which is hungry at 3:10 pm on a Sunday afternoon while my big kids play video games and the tiny one sleeps beside me. Will I remember this moment ten years in the future? Will my babies? How will they judge me as a parent when they have had the life experience and analytical skills to do so? At what point will I shift in their minds from "best mama ever" to "she could have done better"? 

Sometimes I think about the moments I value now and compare them to the moments I cherish from my early years as a mother, and that helps to ground myself when I'm feeling as though I'm floundering through motherhood. Often, it is not what I think is so important at the present time, but those little in-between moments that end up being the ones I'd most love to preserve. I believe it's those moments that affect my children the most, as well. After all, aren't most of our beloved memories from childhood the seemingly mundane ones? The afternoons exploring grandma's backyard, cuddling up to Mom in the bentwood rocking hair, sunrises and orange juice smoothies with grandpa. And so, how I wrap our mundane moments, whether in harried stress or gentle grace, will determine the value of my children's lasting memories.

I asked River to take a picture of me and Wilder this morning. I take a lot of selfies with the baby, mostly as proof of how small he is in my arms, but there's a quiet magic that's lost in the eye contact, the awareness of when the picture is taken, and the outstretched arm at the edge of the frame. I want a record of how we spend the in-between moments, curled up together, with me either trying to memorize his baby smell or trying to let him know the depth of my love by the number of kisses I place on his silky head.

We are inspired to make our days magical by the likes of Pinterest and Instagram, but what a big undertaking! Sometimes the demands are too much. But what if the magic lies in-between moments, rather than the curated ones? It it these I will remind myself to appreciate today. They are valuable and full of potential. They will never be big and sparkly... rather, they are quiet, unassuming, and sometimes magical.