I can faintly hear a man singing The Star Spangled Banner. It’s coming from the middle school across the street. I find myself crying. I’ve been doing that a lot these last few days. I’m torn and suffused by the truth that absolutely nothing stays the same, pierced by the truth that everything is constantly changing and that nothing is fixed. There are days when this truth gives me comfort and helps me see that being lost is just an illusion too, but today is not one of them. The fall air tickles the hair on my arms and I wonder how my daughter is doing on her first day of high school. I want summer back, and the first vacation Bob and I took together. I want to be dropping Lilly off at kindergarten at the Waldorf school in Santa Barbara again. I want to do my life over, not because I want to do it differently (although, okay, there might be one or two things I tweak but just a tad) but because I want to savor it more.
At the Writer’s Spa this year, one of the participants, Annelle, had just lost her best friend. Annelle’s intention for the spa was “Savor.” It’s my life lesson. To savor. Even the sadness, even being lost. Actually, especially being lost, especially being sad.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Out of the corner of my eye
I catch
The red blush of my neighbor’s Japanese maple
I want to turn away from it’s dying beauty
Dig my heels in, demand that summer stay put, that the kids don’t grow up, that my father’s voice greets me when I walk in the door of the house they don’t live in anymore
I want to act petulant that fall has arrived, as if it’s so unexpected, such a surprise.
But isn’t that the trick of life, the wonder and the ache: that the expected arrives and leaves us gaping
15 responses so far ↓
1 Renae Sep 3, 2008
Wow! My son just started high school also and savor is now my word also. I quit work so I could be home when he gets home. High school will go by so quickly.
2 Renae Sep 3, 2008
Wow! My son just started high school also and savor is now my word also.
3 Tara Benwell Sep 3, 2008
I too love that word. Savor. I’m at the other end, about to send my firstborn to kindergarten. I almost cried when I read that Renae quit work to be home for her high school bound son. Sometimes we new moms fear there will soon be a day when we are no longer needed. Yet I remember having my mom home after high school and sharing the highs and lows of life with her. What a gift her presence was.
4 Diedra Sep 3, 2008
Savor is the word of the day! I too would have loved for this summer to have never ended. It’s our last in Hawaii, so every minute the kids spent here was precious. We tried to cram as much in as we could before we move next year, yet at the same time I found my daughter and I just sitting sometimes and staring, listening to the way the wind sounds as it blows across warm sand and through the palm branches. We both felt it in our bones that this place is so special and we’ll always cherish our time here. I wanted time to move in slow motion so we could feel each experience drizzle over us like warm honey.
Yet at the same time, I was begging time to gain speed, go fast forward, so that it will be December and my darling husband will finally be getting off that plane from Iraq. I keep wanting to be like Sleeping Beauty, so that I can go to bed and not wake up until the day he comes home to me. Each minute I have to get through is the exact opposite of how I felt over the summer. It aches like I’m slogging through scratchy wet concrete.
Now that the kids have gone back to Florida, time is even more troublesome and still at odds with itself in my mind.
This year my son also started High School, and my daughter is a senior! On one hand I can’t wait for them to grow up. I love the astounding people I see them becoming, and can’t wait to enjoy them as adults. Though like you Jen, I also wish I could go back to those lovely days when they were 3 and 5.Of Blues Clues on the living room floor while we eat breakfast in our jammies, making forts out of the entire living room with every blanket we owned, then spending the night thereThe simplicity of discovering the world through their innocent eyes like I had never seen it before.
Hmmm..I guess if I have such incredible memories I must have been savoring it! Here’s a thank you for the reminder to keep it up!
Now to figure out how to savor that concrete slogging….
5 Pam S. Sep 4, 2008
I think we have to complete an entire cycle of the Great Wheel of the Year when we’re grieving. You still have a way to go, Jen. Blessings & prayers are sent your way.
My daughters are adults and my granddaughter is finishing Middle School this school year.
This is the time of year, it starts about a week before Labor Day, when I start to get excited about possibilities! It used to be about new shoes, notebooks, new pens & pencils…but now it’s about classes, or coffee with friends, or new “anything!”
I know “everything is dying” and we (esp. where I live) are going into winter. Yet I love the change of seasons, the feel of change, the expectation of rebirth in the spring! We need all of it to be whole…kids growing & changing, becoming members of AARP (!), fresh perspectives on life & love. We need it all.
“Savor” is the word of the day! p.
6 Marisa Sep 4, 2008
I too am mourning the end of summer, simply because here in the Northwest the summer leaves too quickly. I know that it’s part of the cycle, like being pregnant or going to college. There are great things about being pregnant or being in college, but being stuck in either situation forever would block the flow of the joy from the outcomes of those things. I see the autumn decorations in all the stores…and I want to be happy about the season changing, even if it means no more laying in the backyard with my dogs, putting away my beautiful jeweled sandals and wearing coats . Change can be a beautiful thing, but usually it’s because we’re expecting it as a solution to a current problem.
7 rebecca Sep 4, 2008
Ahhh CHANGE – a constant companion lately – one I haven’t yet become comfortable with – but have learned to warily accept. I so know the feeling of wanting to “do over”.
I have reached a place I call “Point Zero” – a large part of my past behind me and a new future opened up before me – a true and clear Turning Point. But it is like standing in a room full of doors – while I have at least finally turned from the door that just closed (no opening back up for a “do over” I fear) – I haven’t yet located the next open door and am uncertain just which door to choose. I wonder will it become clear to me or am I going to have to figure it out. I suspect I must learn to choose – rather then just going with any old door that might open (haven’t I rather identified that as a previous “wissue’?).
Savoring the Day is a book by Judith Benn Hurley – probably out of print now – that I ran into years ago and fell in love with the concept (and it was one of those books that stayed with me and finally I bought my own copy). Savor, doesn’t it just roll off the tongue, like really good chocolate.
Thanks for the reminder – I’ve been looking for a word to set my intentions to – Perfect!
8 Mary Lynn Archibald Sep 5, 2008
Hey Jen,
I want to wish you both the best of luck with 9th Grade, and Lilly, stay away from those Senior boys!
Loved the poem. It’s yours? Can I copy it to my “Remembrance” file?
Still thinking about the Writers’ Spa.
Did I thank you for the great review of my book?
9 Renee Brown Sep 5, 2008
My Sam is a 9th grader as well…it hit me very hard that I really only have four years left with this amazing creature! I have vowed to do a better job of hearing him, including turning away from the computer and sitting next to him on the couch!
Autumn is so fraught with emotion – we just have to ride the cyclical wave!
love to you jen…
10 Barbara Sep 6, 2008
This is truly a delight to read. Thank you.
11 Lisa Sep 7, 2008
In Nelson, New Zealand (where my hubby, James is right now) the city has a slogan that resonates with the word savor; ‘live the day’. Not seize it, but live it, savoring all that it has to offer you and that you have to offer it. Ahhh…savoring’s gooooood stuff, n’est pas? (:
12 Kim Sep 8, 2008
I also have a freshman this year . . . my beautiful Hannah. She started high school, I entered the last year of my 30s, and my husband moved out in June. These changes, like the turning of autumn leaves, are here to stay for me. In many ways, I fear savoring this time, because the changes are so hard. Your words, Jen, are a beautiful reminder that we only get one shot at this lifetime, however. Every second, every experience, is absolutely precious. Thank you, thank you, Jen, and many others for these wonderful reminders to embrace, experience and savor.
13 Jennifer Sep 8, 2008
We are all riding the waves together… tonight Lilly is off with Chris for the next almost two weeks, and my sweetheart is gone for the week…. The space, after a week of intense family visiting and Lilly and all that, suddenly feels huge. Another wave to ride!
i adore all your voices – thank you for being as smart and tart and funny and kind as you each are.
14 Gina Hyams Sep 11, 2008
Jennifer, I found my way here today from your comment on Margaret’s blog. I, too, have a beautiful daughter who’s just started high school. Our time together feels suddenly so precious and limited…the clock ticking ’til she’ll fly the coop. I don’t have any close friends who are at this same stage of life, so it was especially heartening to read your post. Thank you.
15 Nancy Sep 19, 2008
Wow. I cried when I read this post. My daughter is now 20 and a junior in college. I grieve for the days when she was my little pal and everyday had a new adventure ahead for us. She is stretching and furiously spreading her wings now and there is little, if any time, for old mom. I am told this is how it is supposed to be but that she will be back to me. I wish I really understood, then, how precious all of those hours were. I miss her so much. And, yes, I am seeing a therapist.