Time

I was born on a cool, Fall Saturday morning in 1971.

That might explain why Saturday mornings are my favorite times during the week.  It's often quiet in my house, which gives me time for prayer, devotion and reflection.  Creaking bones and sore hips and knees when I rolled out of bed one such Saturday morning, reminded me that I had driven almost 200 miles the day before, both in the course of work, and transporting a group of kids from an amusement park.  Clearly, I am not the long driving road warrior I used to be.  Time passes quickly.

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I remember being a small child, running through the house, chasing my older sister.  I got my first lesson in watching where I was going when I caught a doorknob in the eye from a door my sister suddenly closed during the chase.  Mostly I remember those days as ones of tireless exploration, even if we could never wander far from the house (we were not allowed to wander anywhere our mother couldn't see us from any window in whatever house or apartment we lived in).  We always made our own adventures, playing out whatever stories we had scene enacted on our favorite cartoons, or we had read in a book earlier that week.

I remember elementary school as a time of expanding boundaries, frequent moves and learning the art of making friends quickly.  We changed schools multiple times during those years, and I rapidly figured out that if I didn't want to spend a lot of time alone, learning to read kids and seek out those willing to be friendly was going to have to become an art form I needed to master, the sooner the better for each change of location.  During that time I developed the ability to talk to anybody, at any time, about any subject you can think of or make up.  I also learned that carefully placed silences can be as comforting as conversation, and becoming a good listener is a talent few people really cultivate.  Being a constant outsider had it's advantages

Middle and High School brought some level of stability, as I was able to start and finish at the same schools, and I learned that relationships could be sustained over longer periods of time.  Here I was told that it was time to start planning my future.  Of the many iterations of What I Want To Be When I Grow Up that passed through my mind (and out of my mouth), the final two I settled on were actress or journalist.  I left high school, that became Actress (despite my crippling stage fright), Director, Producer and Writer.  I drifted far away from these goals as early motherhood became my reality, and all dreams artsy drifted into the frenzied background of a life spent in the constant care of and attention to first one, then two children. False starts, seminars, weekend classes, and eventually a sideline into IT later, all that remained was my desire to write.

I look back over my life in the 20+ years since the State of California legally declared me an adult, and I see not only a world that's changed, but a person that has had to learn and adapt to whatever the world threw at her.  Jobs, found and lost.  Frequent changes of residence.  The ups and downs of relationships.  New technology, both necessary and extraneous.  With all of these things, what I sincerely hope, is that I have learned things that will help me with my own children.  I truly believe that you learn to parent by remembering your life as a child, so that you can reference every stage they experience balanced against your own life.  We are not authoritarian strangers who don't understand what it's like to be young.  We've been where they've been, and once our children realize that we might just actually "get" them, without condemnation or condescension, we might finally find them listening to our offered wisdom and warnings.

It's not for the faint of heart, this business of shaping new adults.  Time transforms us all, from infant to child to teen to adult, with all of the lessons learned and wisdom earned along the way.  It's our job to remember, and pass what we know and all that we've learned on to the younger ones, enabling the next generation to build on whatever we started while innovating their approach.  This is how successful societies are built and sustained, and the one thing I hope will continue into the future.

In 10-15 years (Knock Wood!), I will likely add grandparent to my list of titles.  By then I will have had even more experiences to add to the education I'll be passing on to my own children.  And will be able to start anew passing on the stories, lessons and wisdom of my childhood years on to my next generation.  As I should.