Rewind the Time

Two weeks ago, I stepped into what always feels like a time tunnel, a portal of sorts. I entered a metal tube that carried me forward in time and to the other side of the planet. When I exited the tube, I made my way into the home of my son, Dylan, his wife, Mika, and their three children, Kai (6), Rei (4), and Mila (18 month old princess).

For the next several days all my energy and focus was invested in spending time with them, soaking up hugs and playing as many games of Go Fish, Concentration and Connect Four as is humanly possible. I gave them presents. I ate them up. I drank them down. I breathed them in. I kissed their heads. I held them tight.

At some point in all of this, it occurred to me that Dylan is the same age now as I was when he was Kai’s age, which triggered flashbacks to the 35-year-old-mom version of myself, and it seriously feels like I went from mama to grandmama in about 2 seconds. How did it get so late so soon?

The old saying is true: the days drag and the years fly.

And then, it was over. I went back into the time tunnel and found myself on this side of the world again. When I landed at Dulles and switched my phone out of airplane mode, this text from Mika appeared: I have to tell you what Kai told me in the bed tonight.  He said, “I’m really missing GHaven. I wish I could rewind the time and she could come here again. I’m ok to give back all the presents (she gave me) if I could do that.”

“Rewind the time.” Out of the mouth of babes, right?

What would I give to rewind the time with my grandchildren? With my own children? With my mama? With my daddy?

Kai said he’d give back the presents to have a little more of my presence. <SIGH>

I was reminded of the words of the Jim Croce song Time in a Bottle: “there never seems to be enough time to do the things you wanna do once you’ve found them.”

So I’m not going to say the obvious: life is short, live the dash, don’t wait to love, cherish the moments, be here now. Not gonna say those things.

I’m just going to say that I hope that when my life’s time dwindles down to days, hours, moments, and I enter that dark tunnel leading to time after time, I hope I have loved with such intention that those I leave wish they could rewind the time with me.

“We are so brief.
A one-day dandelion.
A seedpod skittering across the ice.
We are a feather falling from the wing of a bird.
I don’t know why it is given to us to be so mortal and to feel so much.
It is a cruel trick, and glorious.”
(Louise Erdrich, Native American author)

Written by Haven Parrott, Manager of Bereavement Support Services, at a recent Time of Remembrance at the Hospice Home.