It's Just Temporary
It all feels temporary. Everything. The weather. Your friends. Your car. Your home. The body you inhabit. Size six today. Ten tomorrow. All temporary.
Some things are a longer kind of temporary- a marriage or your children. Maybe your children most of all. The pregnancies that seemed to last until you just 'can't do-it-one-more-day' abruptly end. The newborn that kept you up all night. The sore and cracked nipples from breastfeeding, just temporary- excruciating but temporary.
Preschool days, summers, bad haircuts, the car that smelled like sour milk- all gone. The jobs that come and go. The friends that flit in and then out, all controlled by the passage of time and destiny, in other words, temporary.
Lovers, mothers, and fathers. Babies and grandparents both sliding along the same continuum. Babies aggressive and uncompromising in their demands to walk, talk and then run to toddler hood are oblivious to time. Grandparents are well aware of the bittersweet thing called 'time'. Some days it's a friend and some days a foe.
I looked at a co-worker nearly twenty years my junior last week. I watched her profile. She's newly married and her face is unlined. Ready to cast a jealous eye, I dismissed it almost as soon as I was aware of the thought. Was I? No. Not jealous. Not even envious. Curious.
Does she know yet? Has she felt it? When will she realize she's temporary? Maybe not until she sees her own child crawl, stand, and then walk away from her. Maybe then. Maybe when she's the mother on Mother's Day. Someday she will see a picture of herself and think, "How did this happen?" And then maybe.
Maybe only some people feel temporary and others are so firmly rooted, it takes them by surprise. I don't know. I'm firmly in the camp called "Temporary". Always with the same thought not too far from the surface...It isn't a wolf (or maybe it is in disguise) but time and a few of his buddies-fate and destiny, that will threaten and eventually succeed to "...huff and puff and blow your house down".
There's a comfort in knowing everything is temporary. It softens the blow and opens the doors to different tomorrows. Maybe better tomorrows.
The only thing that feels permanent to me is that stupid tattoo I got five years ago. That is definitely permanent. Regrettably, unalterably, permanent.
Some things are a longer kind of temporary- a marriage or your children. Maybe your children most of all. The pregnancies that seemed to last until you just 'can't do-it-one-more-day' abruptly end. The newborn that kept you up all night. The sore and cracked nipples from breastfeeding, just temporary- excruciating but temporary.
Preschool days, summers, bad haircuts, the car that smelled like sour milk- all gone. The jobs that come and go. The friends that flit in and then out, all controlled by the passage of time and destiny, in other words, temporary.
Lovers, mothers, and fathers. Babies and grandparents both sliding along the same continuum. Babies aggressive and uncompromising in their demands to walk, talk and then run to toddler hood are oblivious to time. Grandparents are well aware of the bittersweet thing called 'time'. Some days it's a friend and some days a foe.
I looked at a co-worker nearly twenty years my junior last week. I watched her profile. She's newly married and her face is unlined. Ready to cast a jealous eye, I dismissed it almost as soon as I was aware of the thought. Was I? No. Not jealous. Not even envious. Curious.
Does she know yet? Has she felt it? When will she realize she's temporary? Maybe not until she sees her own child crawl, stand, and then walk away from her. Maybe then. Maybe when she's the mother on Mother's Day. Someday she will see a picture of herself and think, "How did this happen?" And then maybe.
Maybe only some people feel temporary and others are so firmly rooted, it takes them by surprise. I don't know. I'm firmly in the camp called "Temporary". Always with the same thought not too far from the surface...It isn't a wolf (or maybe it is in disguise) but time and a few of his buddies-fate and destiny, that will threaten and eventually succeed to "...huff and puff and blow your house down".
There's a comfort in knowing everything is temporary. It softens the blow and opens the doors to different tomorrows. Maybe better tomorrows.
The only thing that feels permanent to me is that stupid tattoo I got five years ago. That is definitely permanent. Regrettably, unalterably, permanent.
Wow, that's deep, Jen! Made me think! I think I"m also more in your camp. I often think that nothing really matters, but curiously it's not depressing, it's more like it's liberating. Hard to explain. But you might know.
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