It’s December. December 1st exactly.
Part of my work right now is photography. It’s been holiday photos and “say cheese!” It brings to mind that I capture time in a photo. I help others freeze time and hold onto it. I have been so busy.
This morning I am sitting across the table from this amazing ginger haired girl. Her soul I admire. Her laugh, contagious. She’s humming ..”Christmas bells are ringing,” by Natalie Cole. I am always in awe that I got the privilege to be the mother of this human being. I captured the moment in a photo.
I keep putting this piece down and then picking it back up, either in my mind, here pressing these keys, or earlier this morning when I was hearing what to write while looking in the mirror.
The last couple months have been different with small challenges and big changes for my daughter and me. She is sixteen now. Control over four wheels and a seatbelt has happened. I’ve learned that for me to get driven to the local coffee shop and for her to pay the bill, her permit magically did that. Money- she’s had a job now too, and she juggles her school schedule, social life, plus work pretty well. Minor stresses but she’s really got it under control. Last night, quarter to midnight, as I was half asleep on the couch, she put in my face this amazing brochure she created for a history project. Saturday morning she volunteered to take children from our local rotary club to shop for families and Christmas. Her heart is ginormous!
On the serious side of things, she started new appointments. When these appointments started months ago, I had a flashback..but it was my reality. I was in that same exact building about 17 years ago but she was in my womb. I was months pregnant with her and worked in the building just next door. The office would get breakfast from over there on Market Street – fast forward from 2000 to 2017, Chloe is now going to a therapist in the exact same location. My everything stopped. My heart paused. My breathing froze when the memories flooded my mind. First appointment she exclaimed very clearly, “Mom- I do not want you to go in with me!” I had to excuse myself from the first session thirty minutes in saying, “but she wants to do this alone,” and I held back the tears in the waiting room.
I put this down and picked this piece up again days later.
She got in the car and spoke how she did an art project. She said immediately she thought it was stupid. The assignment was to draw a jar, bubbles inside and then fill them with reasons she had anger. Am I one of the reasons, I know I am.
How did I already get to forty years old? I remember being 15, 16 and learning from a mentor about story strands, and how that stuck with me, is so true. Here I am connecting 17 years ago to my now.
The cluster of the time, the strands of moments, heart stories and how we love and value one another is so very important. It’s now December 14th, the month is already halfway over. It’s that time of year that we think of others more. Or there is that heightened spirit of kindness, genuine or expectation of it. Do we get this at the end of the calendar year to make nice with what was not good from January to November? Do even the Scrooge’s get a second chance? If it’s whatever month.. whichever season, the same line keeps coming to my mind… be in the moment.
