Where does the time go

Silver woke me up at 3:45 this morning wanting breakfast. I wasn't quite ready to agree that 3:45 was morning, so I shut the bedroom door and went back to bed. That bought me about forty-five minutes. At 4:30, I gave in, got up, fed him, made my coffee, and started another ordinary morning with my little buddy. Silver has a routine. Breakfast is only the beginning. Once his belly is full, it's playtime. And he takes that part of the schedule pretty seriously. So there I was, coffee nearby, playing with Silver like I have a thousand mornings before, when I really started watching him. Not just looking at him. Watching him. And suddenly I could see that little kitten again. Not because he's gone. He's not. That kitten is still right there in Silver. I see him every day. The same curiosity. The same playfulness. The same look in his eyes when he's getting ready to pounce on something. The same little troublemaker who can turn absolutely nothing into the greatest game ever invented. He's bigger now, of course. So am I, although unfortunately mine didn't happen in quite the same direction. But our routine really hasn't changed that much. We just know each other better now. And sitting there this morning, I wondered, where does the time go? It seems like yesterday that Silver was a tiny Bengal kitten, all ears, paws, spots and energy. Yet somehow, without either one of us noticing it happen, all those ordinary mornings became years. That's the strange thing about time. The big moments announce themselves. Weddings, births, graduations, goodbyes. We know we're supposed to remember those. But most of our lives aren't made out of big moments. They're made out of 4:30 in the morning. They're made out of coffee brewing while the rest of the world is asleep. A cat waiting for you to finish what you're doing because apparently you have forgotten that your real job is entertaining him. They're made out of somebody you love sitting in the same chair they've sat in a thousand times. The sound of a familiar voice from another room. A dog asleep at your feet. A song you haven't heard in thirty years suddenly coming through the radio. And then one day, one of those little ordinary things reaches into your heart and pulls an entire piece of your life back out. There's a word for that feeling: nostalgia. I got curious about it this morning, and the word itself has an interesting history. It comes from Greek roots meaning something close to "returning home" and "pain." It was originally used centuries ago to describe an intense homesickness. I think that's beautiful. Because nostalgia does feel a little like going home, doesn't it? An old song can take you back to a car you haven't owned in forty years. The smell of something cooking can put you right back in your mother's kitchen. Fresh-cut grass can bring back a summer when you were ten years old and your biggest worry was getting home before the streetlights came on. For just a second, you're there. You can almost see the people. You can almost hear their voices. And sometimes you would give anything for five more minutes. But here's what I've been thinking about this morning. Maybe nostalgia isn't only supposed to make us miss yesterday. Maybe it's also supposed to wake us up to today. Because right now is becoming somebody's "remember when." This morning with Silver will become one of mine. There will come a day when I'd probably give anything to be sitting right where I am now, holding this cup of coffee, watching that spotted little goofball wait for me to play with him. So why wait until something becomes a memory before realizing how beautiful it was? Maybe we need to look around once in a while and realize, this is it. These are the good old days while they're still happening. Call somebody you've been thinking about. Sit a little longer with the person you love. Take the long way home. Watch the sunset instead of taking a picture and walking away. Play with the cat even when you've got something else to do. And if somebody you love tells you the same old story you've already heard fifty times, maybe listen to it one more time. Someday, you might miss hearing it. I started this morning wondering where the time goes. I think maybe I know. It doesn't really go anywhere. It becomes us. Every person we've loved, every place we've been, every ordinary morning we thought didn't matter, they're all still tucked away somewhere inside us. Sometimes all it takes is a song, a smell, an old photograph, or a playful Bengal cat at 4:30 in the morning to open the door. Silver is still waiting for me to play. The coffee can wait. How about you? What ordinary moment from your life would you love to step back into for just five minutes? I have a feeling some of the greatest memories of our lives weren't anything special at the time. We just didn't know yet how special they were. Love you all. Finius