Midweek Pick Me Up

I want to share a quote from the author Anna Quindlen.

“The biggest mistake I made [as a parent] is the one that most of us make. … I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of [my three children] sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages six, four, and one. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night. I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less” (Loud and Clear [2004], 10–11).

Ok mothers of young children, how many times have you heard this advice? Ten, twenty, a hundred times. Me too. And yet, I still forget it many days. I'm too busy squeezing in another craft project just to check it off the list, rather than viewing it as a chance to bond. I'm snapping photos like mad to preserve the moment for me rather than imprinting it in my own memory. I'm longing for the silence that accompanies nap and school hours rather than delighting in the cheerful noise that tells me someone who loves me is by my side. It's so easy to yearn for the past or future, no wonder we need reminders to live in the moment. Try to get a little less done today, and enjoy the present. After all, the dishes can always be done tomorrow. :-)

Midweek Pick Me Up

http://laugh-learn-love.blogspot.com/2008/07/midweek-pick-me-up_09.html