All The Beautiful Days

I often find myself adrift in all the beautiful days that my life has given me. It’s breathtaking to consider. Sure, there have been disappointing days, sad days, mad days, hopeless days, you-know-what-I-mean days but there have also been a remarkable number of beautiful days. There must be something about getting older that makes me pause to float on a memory of a long ago bicycle ride, or a place that I once called home, or a certain summer night with a lover, or the depth of a newborn’s eyes, or the majestic beauty of an April day in Yosemite Valley. You know what I mean.

I want so much to go back and experience the days again or, in some other way, hold onto the moments. When I was much younger, I don’t think I had any real idea of the beautiful days. The hours unfolded and I played them out without being aware of how precious they were. As the years and the memories piled up, perspective came into play. I knew people who had died or people who were visited by great tragedy. I began to occasionally remember some earlier time in my life when all seemed golden and that was the beginning of moments of nostalgic melancholy. But, I was busy. I was raising kids, working, trying to do the healthy things, and doing my best to hold it all together. There was no time to linger in the shadows of memory.

Now there is more time to dally in those shadows. I’m still too busy. It’s my nature. But there seems to be more stillness, more flashes on the past, more glimpses of some magical yesterday and, of course, why wouldn’t there be? I have lived a lot of days. Part of me wants strategies that will remove the inclination to dawdle in that reflective moment. Pausing there can evoke a soft or sharply tender bruise. “Move on,” I say chastising the part of me that wants the impossible. But an even wiser part of me says memory is part of the whole catastrophe (per Zorba). Dance with it. Embrace the images. Welcome all the feels. They are still part of the beautiful days.

What do you think?

Here’s a smattering of my beautiful days.