So fast

Tonight our Sunday dinner at Farley's was a celebration of Lauren's 16th birthday.  Lovely and brilliant Lauren, who was just a baby when Nat and I started dating.  A baby who, incidentally, loved me, even as she was terrified of her big, bearded uncle (don't worry, they get along fine now).   The world's most cooperative toddler, who happily played with a spoon while we ate out at restaurants.  The little girl who loved scrapbooking and following me everywhere.  The big sister to triplets.  The ambitious teen.  I've watched her grow up, and I knew it was coming--  But wouldn't you know, its still a shock.

It really does happen so fast. 

Tonight she took Ivy down with her to clean up the dock after dinner.  They walked off together, soft August lake-light glancing off their shoulders, and it hit me-- she used to be the baby, this tall young woman.  Somehow in my heart she is still Ivy's size, a little bit of a thing, foreign and exciting all at once to Nat and I, the first baby in our families, a taste of what might come next in our fledgling relationship.

Except we're here already, to the "what comes next."  Fast forward through life and that's MY three year old dancing across the road, not my niece.  My niece just got her driver's permit.

So fast!

And tonight Jack shared with us that he has his first wiggly tooth, and he starts first grade in a week and he is almost six years old and you should see the size of the clothes I bought for him today and wasn't it just yesterday we drove him home, with fear and trembling, for the first time? 

So fast!

Sitting in front of the yellow cottage, chatting and soaking in the evening breeze and the leisure time before dinner, it could have been 10 years ago.  But we have these walking reminders among us that time has indeed passed.

So fast.

Friends of ours have recently had devastating news about their five year old daughter.  They went on vacation, she got sick, and suddenly they are battling a brain tumor.  It is wrenching and terrifying and my heart is torn for them.  They are a truly wonderful family and they don't deserve this.  Who does?  These things should never happen to a child. 

This week, when I am not thinking about Rebecca, the little one fighting so hard right now, I am thinking about how time passes.  How life clicks along in its inexorable routine and how so often we are too caught up in it all to notice time disappearing on us.  How in the midst of laundry and dishes and bills and the ridiculous first-world problems that define our modern life, it is so easy to lose sight of what life is really about.  How we push so hard to get things done, to keep on track, on time, ahead, never asking why that is all so important. How I turn around and stop for a breath and my baby is almost 6, driving  me crazy, playing video games  and testing my patience, a wild silly thing who hardly holds still for a hug. And how I am going to miss him being almost 6, miss it like mad, when I turn around again and he's learning to drive.

So fast. 

Hold them close, the ones you love.  Memorize their smell.  Let them linger a little longer, even if you don't have the time.  Cling to this moment with them.  We only get this moment once.