Best Wishes

I'm going on vacation.* (I know some of you are thinking, Hey, didn't she just go on vacation, like, two weeks ago? And yes, I took two days off. But this is a longer, festive, going away vacation. So stop judging.)

I'm going on vacation so I can attend a wedding. More specifically, I'm going to the wedding of my youngest cousin, Chris.

To be perfectly honest, I don't really know Chris all that well. This is partially due to the fact that I was 15 when he was born. I remember it quite well. I remember my aunt plunked him into my arms and I was like, DUDE, I am NOT the baby-holding type and just prayed that he wouldn't start to scream or throw up on me. He actually did neither, but looked up at me like "Seriously, what's your damage?" and I immediately loved him. (Plus, he was a pretty cute baby.)

But my aunt and uncle lived about an hour away, and I was a teenager who had, you know, important teenager stuff to do, so it's not like I saw him all that often. Teenagers and babies don't usually kick it in the same circles, and the age difference? Let's just say this: he was in kindergarten when I was in college. I was teaching high school when he was IN high school. It's an odd dynamic.

And now he's getting married.

It's kind of freaking me out. Not because of the "OMG I'm SO OLD YIKES" because I honestly don't feel that way. It's more of a sense of -- where have the years gone?  How did I not notice how quickly time passes?  And -- since it does pass so quickly, shouldn't I make sure to spend it well? Shouldn't we all try to do that? Not with regret and anger and fear, but with happiness and an open heart?

I know this: if my time is rushing by, then I want to know that I have used those moments joyfully and lovingly.

Which, at the end of it, is what I am hoping for Chris and his lovely Sam. That the time goes by in joy and love.  Those are my best wishes.

*So yeah, I might post while I'm on vacation. I probably will. But maybe not every day... we will definitely return to regularly scheduled programming on August 11th.