Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Time

I remember as a little girl hearing a song my sister used to play on an old 45 record called “Time Good, Time Bad” I may be wrong but it seems like it was Bobby Goldsboro that sang it. For the life of me, I couldn’t find it anywhere while searching for the title, lyrics, or artist.

However, if memory serves, the song had a great message.

It talks about how Time can be good or time can be bad depending on how we view it.
The song tells a story of a person who one day looks out their window and sees a young child crying. The child is frustrated with time. Will it ever stop and see, or must he always be a child? Time is always passing him by and therefore, it seems he will never get to grow up.

So, the person goes out walking. They come upon an older woman who is heartbroken because of time. In her lifespan, time has done nothing but rushed by. Time turned her hair to gray and put wrinkles in a face that once was so lovely to see. Her time is coming to an end and as days rush swiftly by, time has done nothing but left her aged and worn.

Finally, the person meets up with the a man who is satisfied with Time. This man is coming to a point in life where he can look back and see what time has done for him and says, “Time, you’ve been so good to me.” Time brought him a life filled with love and experience and he wouldn’t trade a minute of his valued time.

For some reason the song comes to my mind periodically when I feel I have no time, or rather, when I feel I can’t or I simply don’t take the time, whichever the case may be.
It is said we always make time for what is most important to us. I think we certainly try. But real life sometimes even hinders our best intentions of taking the time to do what we want or what we think we should do.

I can’t help but think to myself how quickly time is flying by. There are so many things to get done. So many tasks to accomplish, that at times, it feels overwhelming and it’s hard to stop and just take a deep breath and try to slow the pace a bit.

At the end of the evening, when I come home from work, often times I will go in and kiss my son good night. Sometimes I’ll sit on the edge of his bed and watch him for a minute and play with his dog that insists on snuggling up beside him to sleep. My son is sound asleep so he doesn’t even know I am there. It’s usually in those moments that I watch my son that I realize time is moving too quickly.

My point is, there are only so many hours in a day and we can only do so much. We should take time to relax and enjoy. Sure, we all have our responsibilities and pressures. But I don’t want to look back in time with regrets because I spent my entire life, worrying and stressing, (I am a HUGE worrier and stresser, by the way so, I am really working on this) or because I didn’t take the time to enjoy the good times. We need to do those things that will make our time of value.

We only have so many hours in our lifetime, no matter how we choose to use them up. It’s my hope that we can all go to bed each night feeling that we used our hours that day, wisely. Whatever that entails. So that in the end, we can look back and realize time has been good to us.

4 comments:

Cheri J. Crane said...

What a beautiful post, Jeri. And so true. =)Time is picking up speed, but we still need to savor life as best we can.

Stephanie Black said...

Excellent insights, Jeri!

Gale Sears said...

Lovely post, Jeri.
Let's put our feet in the ocean, plant a garden, play with grandchildren, watch a soccer game--all with a deep breath and real enjoyment!
Gale

Jennie said...

I didn't have time to read your blog this morning and now it has taken me two hours to find time to write a hasty comment. You're so right. Time has certainly speeded up in the past few years.