Young no more.

On fleeting parenthood and disappearing moments.

On Sunday we dropped our oldest daughter off at a local college for a week-long, intensive, academic camp. She’s never been away for more than a night or two. This is 7 days away from her life, our life, our normal.

When you have babies and you’re in the trenches you have no time to think, let alone accept what parenthood truly is.

In the simplest terms: If you do your job as a parent well, your children will become contributing members of society, loving members of a faith community, and they will leave you.

No one really emphasizes that last part at the baby shower. You get married and you’re young and fresh and beautiful and you’re entire life is on the horizon and your biggest question is, “Oh my gosh do you want to go on a long weekend trip just you and me up the coast and eat at all the fun restaurants?”

I met my husband when I was 14 and he was 16. We sat across from one another at a Shakey’s Pizza (remember that place?) and the moment I looked at him, I knew. You can call me crazy, but I did, and I still do. He was (*is*) beautiful and kind and he talked to me. I had my wits and I knew he played soccer so I cobbled together *anything* I knew about the sport and tried to make conversation. Fortunately, I did well and eventually we married 8 years later.

I’m 42 now. He’s 45. We’ve been married for 21 years this July, and we have four daughters, and a beautiful life.

And on Sunday we dropped our eldest, 15, off for a week away.

As we were walking around the campus of the college, I happened to glance over at him. The sun hit him just right and I saw the gray in his hair and the wrinkles that have started to softly form around his eyes. He was pushing our 3 month old in the stroller and wearing his Sunday suit. He looked so handsome and stately and….older. In the way that you see a man who has lived a full life and seen things. A man who has worked and hurt and learned a thing or two. He was talking about one of the majors they offer at the college but all I could see was the 16 year old that I fell in love with. He is still there. In fact, he is much more beautiful now than he was when he was carefree and young. He wears the suit of responsibility that you don’t really understand until you accept and realize that you have created these people who you are responsible for. That is the man I saw in the lens flare moment while strolling around the dorm rooms.

The man who I thought I had forever with. The man who cried when they delivered our first daughter YESTERDAY, who we are now dropping off for a week away and who we will soon be moving into a dorm room or sending into the workforce or walking down the aisle.

We aren’t young anymore and I wish someone would have told me it all goes so quickly. Oh, but they did. I just didn’t listen.

So, dear reader, please listen to me.

You may feel like you have forever with those babies and you may be exhausted and wishing for the next month or year to disappear and the next season to show itself.

But please, don’t. Please enjoy it.

Enjoy it because soon you will not be young anymore and you will washing dishes and crying because you wish you could go back - not because it was better then but because it’s so beautiful now and you wish to do it all over again.