The light was brilliant this afternoon, as it often is this time of year. I am a sucker for good light, so even though there was a touch of a chill to the air, we took our schoolwork outside.
It was a good choice. Let’s be honest, it’s always a good choice. I never regret hauling the books outside, even if it means wrestling an uncooperative infant into a sweater and bonnet. There’s always a payoff— like leaves! And birdsong! And oh, that golden light.
Life has been so very busy these past few weeks, and in truth it looks to stay that way for quite some time. We are living in a season of so much coming and going and planning and doing that I feel pulled a bit thin, but also somehow strangely at peace. You know what they say about the good old days slipping away before you realize you were even in them? I’m keenly aware that I am in them. In a few short months, I will welcome my first grandchild. A few weeks after that, and my cherry on top baby girl will celebrate her first birthday. A few more weeks, and Mathaus will walk across the stage and accept his college diploma. A handful weeks more, and Mary Hannah will be married.
These are the good old days. How can they not be? I can taste all of the lasts even as I’m drinking in the newness of so many exquisite firsts. It’s stretching me heart to places I never even knew I could go.
All of these thoughts, which come to me the clearest late at night when Alice has stirred, make afternoons like these so much sweeter. The light was good today. Phin drew countless leaves in his sketchbook, then painted them with his watercolor pens. Birdie did her math, only mildly distracted by the Downy Woodpecker that sampled our suet feeder before settling on the trunk of a nearly naked Maple tree alongside our drive. Jude read a Bob book to me, then collected leaves to show Alice. Simon wrote an outstanding review of the Secret of the Hidden Scrolls series for presentation in his CC class, then joined me to work through his math lesson. John Mark worked on his Latin in a rocking chair on the front porch.
Life itself is golden in so many ways. When you realize that these days are precious, and fleeting, the good old days are the present, every day.