These Days - Musings on Time

I love this picture. It's my current favorite. How can you look at that smile and not break into a big grin yourself? When I snapped this shot though, I didn't feel like smiling. I was frustrated by the bedtime routine, running out of patience trying to keep her on task.

She lives on a whim. In her world time rolls on forever, punctuated only by the schedule I impose on her. Until recently I'm not even sure she knew time existed. The difference between nap time and night-nights confuses her. Isn't it all just sleep time? Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. Aren't we just eating? Although lately she's been asking, "What day is today? What day is next?" She's also curious about the clock. "What does the clock say? What does 5 mean?" (Incidentally, 5 means dinner time in our house.) She's realizing that life is controlled by something more than our whims.


I'm searching for the balance between guiding her to stay on task in a world where time governs us, while honoring her free spirit that balks at my need to go here, get there, do this, do that. What does it look like to mother within the boundaries of our daily schedule and still give her emotions and imagination room to mature?


It's a balance I'm trying to strike for myself as well. The more I think about (and read & write about) it, the more convinced I am of our need for time to just be. Will tipping the scales in favor of free time cause our scheduled times to feel less like a race against the clock? Can we find time to remember what it feels like simply to be? 

"If we are not careful, it is all too easy to fall into becoming more of a human doing than a human being, and forget who is doing all the doing, and why." ~Jon Kabat-Zinn