Time Well Spent

I have started doing the thing my mom always did that I swore I would never do.

It’s frustrating mostly because I know how annoying it is. But it’s also frustrating because I don’t know...

Today is mom’s birthday and it’s been a really tough year and I feel like we’re closer than we ever have been. Part of that is the adoration my daughter has for her. Hollie just worships her. It’s funny how we see one another differently when we look through...

I remember loving my Nana so much that sometimes I felt like she’d been put on this planet just for me. So I watch Hollie love my mom that way and I feel the shared blessing that love is for all of us.

Another part of our closeness is the loss of my Nana. Though it means very different things to each of us, the conditions are the same.

We had developed a habit of devotion to Nana in her final years. When we lived in Easley, mom and Hollie and I got in the car one Saturday every month and drove the three hours to Florence so that Nana could see Hollie as she was growing and changing. In those monthly six hours of car time, my mom and I talked about...

When we moved to Columbia in 2012, the trips became sleepovers, mom staying with us before heading on to Florence for a visit the next day. Hollie and I were going to Florence weekly, and I told her the devotion I had to my Nana she would one day have for...

What my mom and I finally figured out was that what we really needed was time. Time together to get used to one another, to see each other as Hollie’s Mom and Nana’s daughter.

Time apart to process those conversations and find better ways to communicate.

Time together to listen to one another as Sam’s daughter and Kasie’s mom.

Time apart to be better at wife, sister, mother, friend, and then time together again to share how we’d fared.

I’m proud we learned to value the time we had and that we continue to spend it wisely before it is gone.

That thing I do that she does that makes me (and everyone around me) crazy? 

I trail off. I just start a thought and then stop talking, mid-sentence. It’s as if I...

I find I’m a little bit more like her every day and I like to think she’s a little bit more like me, too. Our influence upon one another is mutually beneficial.

I know the adoration Hollie feels for Mom is partly about time and while they don’t have as much of it together now as when we lived nearby, the time they spend together is that much more precious. They look forward to it and make the most of it.

Like Nana and I made the most of the time we had before she...

What we want to model for Hollie is trust and support, love and patience, kindness and acceptance. We haven’t always been this way to one another or to anyone else, but we’re practicing every chance we get.

Happy Birthday, Momma. I hope you get a lot more time for your birthday. We’ll spend every bit of it, I promise.