One day she's crawling, her turbo charged super fast speed crawl. The next day she tediously puts one foot down in front of the other, wobbling, teetering, walking.
A couple nights ago, as she plopped down from another string of tipsy steps and finished her journey in speed crawl the voice inside my head hopped right in to narrate. "This might be last time you ever EVER see her crawl." And the tears rose up behind my eyes, and my heart knotted into my throat. Can't I freeze time? Hit Pause? Slow this train down?
It seems like Berkley was born five minutes ago, and Milani just yesterday. Now one runs and jumps and strings words into sentences to transfer stories, feelings, ideas. The other babbles mama, and dada and hiya, and is already trying to quicken her unbalanced walk into a trot. The transformation of these beauties makes it painfully clear that the only thing we can be certain about is change. Constant. Endless change.
My immediate response to these moments, the ones I want to bottle up and store safely away forever, is to grab at them, try to cling to them. Replay them, relive them, retain them against the passing stream of seconds and days and years. Dwell in them, because these moments feel so freaking good. But besides being futile, this clinging can be so damaging, so counterproductive. The minute I let myself get suckered into attaching to one particular exquisite moment, well that is exactly when I start missing the treasure of the next moment, and each subsequent moment unfolding in the present.
So when I feel that frantic need to latch on to what's in front of me, to wrap it strongly in my embrace and never let it go, to stop time or at least slow it's frightening pace, I pick up my camera and frame the moment through the lens. I capture this particular facet in time so I can stay present to the new ones coming down the line. I freeze these little moments that make my heart ache so that I can more fully embrace this constant dance of change.
