Only for a Moment, Then the Moments Gone

We've reached the season where worlds collide, summer slows down and the prevailing winds shift back to school. It's a big transition year as kindergarten quickly approaches for the twins.

It's a very bittersweet time for my wife, yet I was actually feeling a bit elated - no more day care bills, all of the kids finally in one school on the same schedule, etc, etc. Today, however, hit a bit differently as I walked the girls into their preschool classroom one last time. The finality of it all.

Our two older children are now entering 2nd and 4th grade; well settled into the whole routine. But their childhood suddenly struck me as so different. Less rushed. More focused on the little milestones. All of those cute things experienced for the first time. Even when my wife was displeased about the whole first ice cream incident (that started out just fine based on the only remaining photo evidence, and yes we still have the Pete the Penguin sweatshirt a decade later after it passed down to each child):

For the twins it was an entirely different parental experience, at least from my perspective... let's hurry up and get to the next stage. No more bottles. No more diapers. Honey, can we finally give away all of these Paw Patrol pups?

Suddenly we have two little, yet fiercely independent girls. Their teachers often share how they have been the most helpful and delightful children. Ally and I always find this a bit hysterical as they are by far the wildest children at home. Always teaming up to do things the older two never would have dared to try. But when we sit back it is so evident that they just don't want to be little girls. They want do the things their 7 and 9 year old siblings do... 5 year old things "are for babies" as they now say often. In the same way it is great that they have quickly advanced it is as equally sad that they have in many ways skipped right over that little kid stuff. And that's the stuff we never get back.

And though they are so alike as identical twins tend to be, they are oh so different in so many ways. Very unique individuals with two very different perspectives. It's quite a wonder to sit back and let them talk about their day. The two versions often tell completely different stories and experiences of the same place at the same time. Eventually parts merge and certain themes arise, but the minute details are so incredibly different.

At the petting zoo the other day Emma raved about Sugar and Honey, how cute they were, how she just wanted to squeeze their faces and hold them in her lap while feeding them straw... how we should absolutely add a baby goat to our family.

Ella on the other hand talked about the farmer who brought the goats. His hat and beard and real tattoos. How he is the husband of one of the teachers and they live together on the farm with a bunch of animals and love the wilderness.

No matter the situation, their perspectives are always perfectly unique.

I've strayed from Vol. 2 of my memoirs the past two years or so, but it begins to appear in front of me again. So much of what I wrote is very much past tense. The kids are no longer little kids. Things I didn't include about my mom, because it felt like a living eulogy, were incorporated into her eulogy a year and half ago already. Time ticks on perpetually. Sometimes it seems slow while we wait for that thing, other times it flies while we're immersed in another thing, but in reality it just steadily moves forward one tick at a time while our lives unfold.

The street was deserted. The headlights of passing cars blurred the wet pavement. Maybe I had had an illusion, I thought. I stood there a long time, gazing at the rainswept streets. Once again I was a twelve-year-old boy staring for hours at the rain. Look at the rain long enough, with no thoughts in your head, and you gradually feel your body falling loose, shaking free of the world of reality.

~ Haruki Murakami, South of the Border, West of the Sun