One of the reasons I bought my Fujitsu Lifebook was its reputation for a monitor that you could read outdoors. At the moment, I’m sitting on the deck of a hotel room in Bethany Beach directly facing the ocean — and the accompanying 8:00 a.m. sunshine. And I can read what I’m writing here. This was the best investment I’ve ever made. I wish more of my financial decisions had been half as successful.
Anyway, I’ve been thinking I should get back to some kind of writing. While I haven’t been able to find the time to do so at work–writing for our blog–a figure I can spare a few personal minutes each morning or evening for my own thoughts.
So, the kids are still asleep and Jeff has headed out to Giant for lunch makings and yogurt. The motel we’re staying at–which we’ve stayed at for years and Jeff’s family has stayed at for years before that–has great efficiency apartment suites. It makes things like breakfast and lunch a bit more reasonable for the budget when you’ve got a good fridge. I’ve never used the stove, however.
I think today was the first day ever that I’ve been at the beach and woken up at 7:00 a.m. Usually I revel in my vacation lethargy till around 10 a.m., ignoring my sister-in-law’s knocks on the door to see if we want to go walking with her. But today I was up at 7:00 and accompanied Jeff on his morning beach ritual–walking to the bakery for donuts. When we’re at the beach, every morning he goes out for fresh donuts. It’s a good thing we’re only here for four days! I, however, have vowed to avoid these luscious confections this year and bought myself some Mini Wheats and 2% milk.
In front of us at the bakery was a mom with two young kids–a little girl who looked to be about 3 and little boy about 5. I thought back, visualizing Gen and Kevin at that age. It’s hard to believe the teenagers asleep in the room behind me are the same people as that little curly haired girl and light-haired boy. It’s hard to believe that so much time has passed. In front of me on the beach, a young father, looks from here to be in his early 30s, is running in and out of the surf with his son, about 6. It calls up Kodachrome slides of my dad with my brother and I on the beach at Long Beach Island. I have a great photo of the three of us, my dad on hands and knees in the sand and my brother and I jumping on his back. It’s crazy how time passes. Our folks grow old, we grow up and follow their footsteps as mom and dad with our own little rug rats, who grow up to…follow in our footsteps? Who knows.
We’ve been visiting colleges with Kevin. That’s another pastime that kind of hits me like a punch in the gut, a reminder of age and time and the inexorable forward momentum of the years. The best years of my life–the kind of years that you want a do-over for, not to fix things but to enjoy them–were my college years. Now let me be clear–I’m not saying my college years were “better” than my life with husband and kids. It’s apples and oranges. Life before marriage, heck, life before supporting yourself, is a completely different animal than life as an independent adult. Not only that, but I’m not at a period of my life where I want to go back and relive any part of the past 20+ years. They have great memories but I don’t want to step away from whatever comes next with my husband and teenagers to a time “before.” But those four glorious years of of independence (at least the 9 months out of each year when I lived on campus) had a freedom and spontaneity that simply can never be recaptured. Neither before nor since have I had so many, and such close, friends. Neither before nor since have I had so much time to be me as “me,” as contrasted with me as “employee” or “spouse” or “mom”–or at the moment all three at once.
Well, enough maudlin prose. It’s 9:00 and the sun is getting really hot, and I need to go inside and wake the kids return to the present.
Alonzi!
