Mirror in the sky what is love?
Can the child within my heart rise
above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean
tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?
- “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac
For me, there is
no season with a pull stronger than the arrival of fall. The crunching leaves, cold nights and shorter
days seem to not-so-quietly whisper the need for change in our daily
lives. Lessons begin, school bedtimes
resume, weekend sporting events replace beach days and suddenly everything in
family life is dominated by the almighty schedule.
I can remember a
time post-college when fall simply meant I got to decorate my apartment doorstep
with mums and buy some cute new sweaters.
Today fall means I’d better get some rest and drink a Sugarfree Red Bull
because my entire world is about to get turned on its head whether I have the
energy for it or not.
So much change
comes with the seasons of parenting small children. As I watched my kids get ready for their
first day of the school year (with varying levels of enthusiasm) I remembered
back to what those firsts felt like for me when I was their age. I can still remember the giant emotional
smoothie that mixed anxiety, excitement, self-doubt and happy anticipation
until you finally felt like the top was going to blow off the blender seconds
before the school bell rang.
My kids were no
different. I could feel their energy as
they braced themselves for big change the same way I can feel the chilly night air
on my skin.
Being a mother has
many upsides, but if after nine years in the game I had to pick a favorite parenting
benefit, I would have to say it the way you suddenly remember. For almost every life
stage I have watched them experience I have remembered something about my own childhood
that until that moment, had been long forgotten. I have been reminded of people, places and
situations that I may never have visited in my memory if it wasn’t for the gift
of watching my own kids.
Things just come
back to you. Things like. . .
- Showing my daughter where to place the silverware on the dining room table and hearing my mother say “Just remember, the spoon, the knife and the fork got in an argument. The spoon and the knife were right, so the fork left”.
- Building a snowman with my kids and picturing my father looking like a young Tony Danza (plus one huge late-80’s mustache) building the very same snowman in the front yard of the house I grew up in.
- Taking a long family road trip and remembering how I used to poke my head from the backseat into the front so I could hear what my parents were saying (wearing a seatbelt was pretty much optional in those days, so why not)?
- Reading bedtime stories to my kids and remembering my mother reading the very same books to me (Santa Mouse is a timeless classic, I don’t care what anyone says).
- Struggling to force an ill-fitting ski boot onto my daughter’s foot and suddenly being back at the very same ski hill as a little girl - hoping my Dad would be able to get my boot on before his fingers froze off (or my toes, whichever came first).
We remember all of
it, don’t we? Admittedly not every
memory is perfect, but then, no family or childhood ever has been. Not only do we recall these experiences, but
we get to live them all over again, as teachers. We build sandcastles, learn to swim, ride a
bike, and get our hearts broken for the first time.
We watch the
seasons change through the eyes of our kids and all the while our own childhood
is playing on some dusty old VHS tape we recorded in our memory years ago. It’s beautiful and emotional and sometimes
painful - but it is a gift.
In those precious
moments of pure childhood bliss we get to be there with them, feeling that same
freedom and lightness through the seasoned eyes of an adult. Only this time, we know how much those
moments matter, and what they’re worth.
