When Time Crawls...

I am not 100% sure when time started moving so fast, maybe after college or maybe after kids or maybe somewhere in between. Whenever it happened I totally missed the change, but here we all are making small talk over and over again about how fast the time is going. “October already, gah! I can’t believe it. It might as well be January”...and now it’s January. 

Happy New Year from Bluff Dale, TX

A while back when I was having this exact conversation, my friend and I started to wonder why time seems to move so fast these days but it seemed to crawl when we were younger. She said she heard that it is because we are not experiencing new events as much anymore. We’ve had 30+ Christmases instead of a handful, we’ve checked off many big milestones like graduations, engagement, marriage and first babies, and we live in the cycle of sleep, work, eat, clean while our minds are constantly occupied with other “to-dos.” 

Well when you put it that way the monotonous schedule sounds kind of sad, but I don’t mean it to be. Despite the seemingly growing items on my To-Do list, I am living the life I once dreamed of. It may also include some big events we never hoped for but as Frank Sinartra says “that’s life (that’s life).” Fast is good. We are busy living!

Four years ago, while I was in the thick of cancer treatment, the days were unbearably long. We had been in cancer land for almost four months and the days crept by. I felt so stuck in time. Even though I had made it through over half my (sixteen) chemo treatments by the first week of 2020 it still felt like there was no end in sight. As if this were going to be my life forever. With a newborn in tow, people would constantly comment things like “don’t blink '' and “enjoy these days, you don’t get them back!” All I could think was PLEASE let me just blink and this nightmare be over. How can I get through these days when there is so much unknown future to worry about? 

My girlfriend said to me recently “That’s a problem for a different day. I don’t need to borrow trouble.” I find myself coming back to this saying whenever I feel anxious or overwhelmed. Her point is a good one but of course suppressing our worries of the future is easier said than done.  Especially because I think part of us has to prepare ourselves for the worst as a form of self preservation. That way when the worst doesn’t actually happen reality is not as devastating.

But maybe the worst has happened to you, your trouble is not borrowed because you are living in what seems like a nightmare that you may never wake up from and time is moving slower than ever. When time crawls these days it is not because we’re not-so-patiently waiting for summer breaks, for Santa to come, or to be a high school Senior. It is because we are dealing with something downright awful. Who can really sit around and worry about getting cancer before they turn 30? If time is moving slow for you now, my best guess is that you are dealing with the unimaginable. Something you never thought you would have to deal with. So what can you do? These are the days when we have to remind ourselves to take it “one day at a time” or even one hour at a time, to suppress our instincts to worry about the future, not borrow trouble from another day and just worry about getting ourselves through today. And when you make it through that day (or hour), make note of it as an accomplishment. Have a little celebration. The road ahead can seem long and without end, but I promise you time is moving forward and you are doing big things along the way. 

A few weeks ago I saw a video that made the suggestion to write down something you accomplished and/or are proud of at the end of every week (and don’t feel like you have to limit it to one!). Then at the end of the year you can review all your notes and look back on 52+ things that you achieved. After seeing this, I realized I could still do that for 2023! I hadn’t written things down throughout the year but that really didn’t matter. And you know what, the list was much longer than I anticipated. This past year threw our family some challenges. Some of them we stepped into with pride and courage and some of them we really didn’t ask for but what are you going to do (that’s life (that’s life)). In the day-to-day, those challenges made 2023 feel slow, unaccomplished, sad and kind of ugly at times. In reality it was all that but it was also so much more. And you know what else? We made it through. 

So cheers to you 2023, for the good, the bad and everything in between. And hello 2024! You have arrived right on time. I’m so glad you’re here.