The Business of Every Day

I marvel as the days get longer and longer, celebrating the light until we pass the tipping point and still enjoying it even as the sunrise is a few minutes earlier and earlier. Two weeks ago when I walked home from my yoga class at nearly nine o'clock the sun had yet to dip below the horizon. I didn't turn on a light as I sat at the kitchen table. Now, at that time, the room is almost dark. I tend to mourn the loss a little more than I celebrate the gain, but the days are still quite long. Summer is in full swing and the weather lately could not be more perfect.

Just yesterday Amos started walking a lot more, going from two three four steps at a time to nearly walking across the room, over and over. He is top heavy and wobbly but beginning to join the world of vertical travel instead of being a lying, sitting, crawling ball of energy. I notice these small changes, too. Watching him learn to walk is actually thrilling and seems almost miraculous except that almost all of us go through this stage and then don't think anything of striding around. I am excited to watch the progress but I already feel nostalgic for my crawling baby. He continues to change little by little each day and week, giggling more, understanding more, becoming capable of more.

We're in another summer of transition. Of the seven or eight summers Ray and I have had together, at least five of them have had a big event. Travel, a wedding, a move, a baby, and at the end of August we'll be moving back to Maine, which has always been our plan. Its strange to think that so much of our life together (and all of our life with Amos) has happened here but now it will continue somewhere else. During our time in Minnesota, we've learned to lean on each other completely. We will certainly miss this wonderful place to live, but we'll be happy when the transition is over.

A minute more or less of sunlight, little hands reaching higher, chubby feet stepping further. Filled with the business of every day, these changes go nearly unnoticed until you look at the sky or see the shadows have shifted. Other times there is something big circled on the calendar and it forces you to contemplate the way everything has been different and the way nothing ever stays the same.