Time Stands Still Until It Flies By
I think, for many of us, the celebration of another birthday, another year passing, tends to make us look back over our lives and take stock.
Where are we related to where we wanted to be? Have we accomplished the things we thought we would? And there�s always the question, once we reach middle age, of how we got this old.
I celebrated my 45th birthday a few weeks ago. As my son pointed out, I have reached middle age. I took exception to that until I calculated that this IS middle age if I live to be 90. And it had a lot of possibility of being beyond middle age if life expectancy, for the average female living in the United States is below this. So I did some checking on the Internet as to average years lived by women in different countries.
If I lived in Afghanistan I would most likely die this year as the average life expectancy for a female there is 45.85 years. In Australia I, too, would be past the middle mark, but barely, with the average lifespan for women being 83 years.
Because Iraq is in the forefront of all of our minds, I checked it out. The average is 68.5 years for females. And the United States? I reached middle age five years ago with the average female life here lasting 80.2 years.
My mother, healthy as a horse, turns 79 this August. I expect her to far exceed this average. She�s thrilled that she now has a great-granddaughter. My hope is that she is with us long enough for Madelynne to truly know her.
She�s an extraordinary person and one from which this child can learn so much.
Middle age is a tough term with which to come to grips. The thought that I am on the downside of this climb is sobering.
The first time I was introduced to my husband I was the same age as my oldest daughter.
I reminded him of this the other day and we both were speechless.
Where had the years gone? When I met him the girls were five and two. Now they�re grown women, both married and one with a baby.
It�s obvious he�s aged. The beard and hair had no gray when we met. He�s 10 years my senior and, as such, I always knew he�d age before me. But now we both complain of aches and pains in some of the same places. The 10-year gap is quickly evaporating.
Infants have a way of pointing out to you that you�ve matured.
Friday evening, Madelynne stayed with us for close to eight hours. Eight hours of rocking, feeding, changing and singing left both of us exhausted.
It had been 17 years since we had a baby in our house.
I thought she was a handful. When I made this observation, my husband was quick to remind me that Ross had been a real handful. Never a good sleeper, constantly wanting picked up, he�d made for some trying times.
And here�s the best thing about Friday: When the baby was getting very tired of our company and we were running out of alternatives, her Mother returned and magically all was right with her world.
Mom packed up her things, bundled her into her car seat and then did the best thing of all in this grandparent game.
She took Madelynne home!
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