Milestones

I've been thinking about milestones.

"An action or event marking a significant change or stage in development."

Sometimes happy. Sometimes not. But always significant.

I seem to be experiencing a lot of milestones the last several years. Upon first glance, they seem to be concerning my children... My sons' senior years of high school. Their subsequent heading off to college. My youngest son's graduating from college and moving 4 hours away. Their marriages. The births of my oldest son's sons. Mind-boggling.

But there's the more personal side of being an empty-nester. There's the fact that all I ever wanted to be was a mom, and, now what? There's the time I told my husband, "I can't believe all I have left is you". Not my proudest moment, but... There's the people who say "I can't wait till I have free time like you have!" and I want to scream at them "Free time is the last thing I ever wanted!", or sumpin like that... But then, there's this wonderful relationship I have with my husband, and how he's my very best friend. There's this time for creative ventures that I never experienced before. And there's this pull toward traveling that I NEVER had before-I was always afraid to travel. Worried about what I was leaving behind and scared of what I find when I got there...But now, there's the fact that the last time I left Santiago, Chile, I sat in the hotel lobby and cried like a baby because...

 There's a willingness to keep going, to change, to connect, to do, to go... even though I remember when my baby boy first left for college, I stayed in the bed for 3 days. I pitied myself because no one needed me. Again, not my proudest moment...

The milestones seem to be coming at record pace now. Some seem really hard! At any given moment in our lives, we could stop. We could say "I don't wanna go further. I'm good right here.", and those around us would completely understand. They'd probably do the same, if they were in our shoes, whatever those shoes may be. The thing is...the world would keep changing. The people we cared about would grow up. They'd move out of our house and grow families of their own. And we'd be sitting there, unchanged. Except for the fact that everything we loved was different. It sounds miserable.

Yet people do that all the time.

Larry and I have decided to go with change. On a daily basis. On an hourly basis when necessary. Because we've learned that we don't have to do it alone. The Creator of the Universe, the One who made us, is right there with us. Urging us on. Stopping to rest with us when we need to catch our breath. Ready to make the necessary repairs to "stuff" when we realize we've messed it up. Ready to help us with the next step, cause that's what life is all about...the next step.

And we can do that. One step at a time.

He knows us best. Even better than we know ourselves. He knew I'd feel lost with an empty house. He knew we'd have a hard time the first time we had to change our oldest GrandBoy's diaper. (It'd been so long since we'd changed a diaper of someone we loved so much. It took both college-educated GrandParents working together, sweating and stressed, but we did it! We may have put it on backwards at first, but we fixed it...) He knew we'd miss our friends as they moved (and continue to move!) away to begin different phases in their lives. We have this same story over and over for thousands of things that have happened in our lives. God knew and He got us through them. Successfully. He knew what was on the other side of that "challenge" and He knew how we'd flourish once there. Maybe I cried a bit, but then I'm pretty sure I laughed.

I call these milestones my "victories". They may not have all been pretty. They may not have all looked like I thought they should look. But standing on this-side of them, I think they look pretty wonderful.

There are many more milestones coming. I can see the tops of their heads. I can hear the footsteps. Sometimes I wanna say "whoa!" and stop. But I won't. I may go at a snail's pace every so often, but I'll still go.

And I'll get there. One step at a time.

And so will you.