On Change
And how we might learn to embrace it
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Sometimes it fills me with dread to see pictures of kids whose diapers I once changed draped in a cap and gown. Of course, I’m proud of them, and obviously would never wish upon them the tragedy of baby food forever.
But watching them morph into grown folks sometimes unravels me. As they change, so do I, so do we. My older son Kai now can reach top shelf items I need a step stool to touch. He schools me about how to be gracious and kind, how to communicate and feel deeply, how to love and take risks.
While he looks forward to playing in the World Cup or being a Champions League star, or going to university, exploring the world, his grandparents are looking backwards at what they did and did not accomplish. In a perfect world, they are looking to him as a mark of their legacies. I can only hope they will see that all they’ve done in their lives has been a gift to help him thrive.
Ancient cultures look at ancestry as a gift. To become an elder means that we can guide the future generations through grief, joy, our changing bodies. To be at the edges of existence means we can see what matters. At the ends of life, we understand that it is how (and who) we love, not what we’ve done, that cement out legacy.
But when you are (as I am) in what my dear friend Pat calls the “Sandwich Generation” — all the messy (and yummy) innards between tending to our children and caring for our aging parents — it’s too easy to forget what matters. Some days I am so wrapped up in what to make for dinner, or a writing deadline to sit with all the feels over the changes in the elders in my life, or my kids transitioning into young adults.
When I see those graduation photos, when I think of how little time I really have left, I force myself to take note of what matters. I won’t be remembered by my work life unless I make my work my life, nor how poorly I clean my house is, nor how terribly I cook. The beings who love me will remember how I presented my love for them.
