Perspective.

First, a story. Sam now hates his bouncy seat. I don’t know how it happened, but the place that for months brought so much laughter, entertainment, and joy (and that’s just to us) has become a downer. He cries even at the sight of it, his little legs kicking in defiance as you hold him above it. I guess it’s like the junior-higher whose stuffed animals get hidden when friends come over, the eight year old who stops playing Candy Land with mom…It’s inevitable, but sad. To me it was a lesson. Sure, they grow up so fast, blah, blah, blah, but more than that I was embarrassed – embarrassed of how seriously I took myself during those first hard days of motherhood. I think I really thought it would last forever. That I would never get a shower again, that I would rock a crying baby to sleep every two hours the rest of my life, that I would never again have five hours of sleep in a row. And yet (sadly I realize), it’s not true. People told me over and over, but somehow the neglected farm animal Fisher price bouncer brought it home. Life FLIES.

Second, a quote. We are watching “The Purpose Driven Life” as a family, and in the first video he says, “Imagine that eternity is a measuring tape from New York to Tokyo. Your life on earth is a few millimeters of that tape.” Again, embarrassment. My tears and worries and work seem to be about all the wrong things.

Third, a tragedy. The day after watching the video a fellow teacher and friend died in a car accident. Same age as me, driving the same road I would drive, the same time I would drive it. Gone. Luckily for Aimee, her funeral was a celebration. She spent her life caring about Jesus and others and all the right things. No, my grief (aside from the heartbreak for her parents) was selfish. Am I ready like she was? I want to get it right, want to care about the right things, want to leave here unashamed…
“Lord, teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”