Time Travel
It is summer, but nearly fall. We’re squeezing in that one final summer gathering before the business of the school year upends our schedules. And while Leila tells me about some drama at work I do my best to listen, but if i’m honest, I’m barely there.
My son is at the edge of the tree line, his face is flushed, a little sheen of sweat on his brow as he dashes between the shadows. His unique-to-him laughter trails behind him like the fading light. Evening nestles into the beginnings of night, and he, with the remaining neighborhood kids, runs wild and free, playing some half-imagined game with only the vaguest of, and ever-changing, rules. They darted into the darkening woods as if nothing in the world can touch them.
For a moment, I am one of these children, back in my own childhood, in the trees with the coolness of the earth beneath my bare feet. The echoes of my friends call out as we chase one another, flashlights darting in the dusk as we searched for lightning bugs and buried treasure. It feels like I could reach back through that hazy recollection and touch it.
I feel… sad. A yearning, a mourning for those free days of wild.
He comes running back, breathless, and I tousle his damp hair and tell him, “You so sweaty.” He laughs, eyes sparkling just like mine used to when I was his age. That same look of exhilaration that only children can master.
He looks like his father, but right now, he is me. In tiny quirks. In too-sweaty hair. He is those little echoes of who I am.
He runs off for more play and I just stand there, gobsmacked, unable to perceive anything but his pure childhood. They grow so damn fast. Too damn fast. The days can be excruciatingly long, but the years blink away in an instant. I want to soak him up, already mourning days gone through our fingertips.
My eyes are bleary with the threat of tears and I hope the twilight is dark enough to hide it.
I miss my baby. And at the same time, I wonder at what kind of adult he’ll be.
When will be the last time he’s willing to hold my hand in public? The last time he’ll mispronounce ‘octopus’? When will be his last day in our family home? Will he move out of state far from his loving mama?
I long for time to stand still because I want more than anything for this moment to last forever. To savor how I love this child more than anyone else in existence.
But time moves on. He plays. And I try to memorize the magic in his laughter.