The Gift of Now

The Gift of Now

I think of my grandmother often but today something occurred to me that I had never realized before. Grandma Layne was better at enjoying the “gift of now” than anyone I have ever known.

This profound bit of wisdom entered my mind while I was floating on a float in a pool I bought for the grandchildren to play in. They had played all morning and their mom wisely made them take a break and go inside for lunch. The empty float in the pool on a hot summer day looked appealing so I decided to enjoy a few minutes of quiet time.

Floating around and looking up at the blue sky I started thinking about past summers.

Summers as a little girl meant my cousin Martha was coming to visit and we counted the days until we could be together. Back then it seemed like summers were longer.

Endless days of exploring on our grandfather’s farm and late night conversations under the covers when we were supposed to be asleep. Catching fireflies and putting them in empty mayonaise jars after the adults poked holes in the top.

Years later summer meant Martha and her children coming to visit and watching cousins play together in our backyard pool. Lots of iced tea and talking while the kids played and laughed. We both enjoyed walking so we would take long walks in the evening while the husbands watched the kids. Fast forward and our kids grew up but we still took beach trips together and Martha always drove over for a few days to visit. And every summer when we went to the beach, she would drive over and stay for a few days. Breast cancer was like a gray cloud hanging over her that we were determined to ignore. She never let cancer control her life.

She was in control….until she wasn’t.

And the tears come. It just doesn’t seem right to have summer without Martha, sweet tea and long walks and talks…or Mom and Grandma raising a garden, laughing together and freezing corn…or Dad driving off to work in his red truck.

Suddenly I Remember Grandma Layne

And that’s when it hit me. I don’t remember Grandma Layne ever crying over the past and she had lots of reasons to shed tears.

Her mother died when before she was 5 and she had no memories of her. She married during The Great Depression and worked hard on the farm and taking care of others all her life. Her father died. Her husband died while I was in college. Her only daughter, my mother, died in 1990 at the age of 51 and the next year her son, Robert, died at the age of 53.

Grandma Layne lived to be 89.

I’m not saying she never cried, but very few times did I ever see her shedding tears. She didn’t live in the past and she didn’t worry about tomorrow. She took life one day at a time and appreciated the gift of now. How did she do that?

How can I do that?

I don’t dwell on the past daily but when a memory hits my heart…it starts to ache and I long for loved ones who are no longer here. It’s like part of my genetic makeup. I start remembering and then the tears start flowing.And when I think about the future I worry…..What if something happens to my husband or one of my children or my grandchildren? What if I get cancer like mom did, or have a heart attack like dad did, or lose my memory? See what I mean? I know we all die of something at some point but if I let myself worry about things out of my control it’s like a landslide of thoughts and emotions.

When we are young we think a lot about tomorrows. When I grow up I want to be this or that. When I’m an adult I want to get married and have 2.5 kids. The future is shiny and tempting and fun to dream about.

Then, when we are in the 4th quarter of our life, the future isn’t shiny any more and the past reminds us of all the things we were, all the people we loved, all the things we did. If we aren’t careful we end up like a truck buried up in mud, stuck and not going anywhere.

Not Yesterday and Not Tomorrow….Just Now

The thing about not appreciating the gift of now is that if we aren’t careful we end up letting yesterday and tomorrow steal the joy from today.

They say that the first step in solving a problem is recognizing you have a problem. I want to soak up every single. drop. of joy. from today that I can.

Here’s my plan. I can’t stop the memories and truthfully I don’t want to, but I can’t obsess over them either. I’ll allow myself ten minutes to be sad….but that’s all. Then I’m going to find something to do to occupy my mind. I’ll kiss and hug a grandchild or go for a walk and count my blessings. So remember this Sadness…you only get ten minutes out of my day.

I’m not going to give worry about tomorrow even ten minutes. I’m going to pray and ask God to take it and then get busy in living right “now.” That’s my plan and I’m sticking to it.

How about you?

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