Time WON'T Slow Down

James 4:14

“... For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.”

{This blog, like every one I write, is a reminder to myself as much as hopefully a message someone else needs to hear. :) }

I see so many posts, especially from young mothers, with the request “time please slow down”.  And I understand what they are wanting—their “babies” are not helpless babies any more.  They are growing into toddlers, preteens, teens, young adults.  I REALLY do understand.  As I write this we are only weeks away from my two turning 32 and 33.  That is the point of this blog.

Time is not going to slow down.  It is going to keep moving at the same rate of 24 hours a day, 12 months a year.  The newborn you hold today will be showing great signs of independence one year from now.  That is why it is so important to enjoy, to experience, to really live each day you have with your children.  If you have to choose between sweeping under your bed and rocking, playing, or reading with your child, leave the dust bunnies to reproduce.  You can clean them out while they are in college. (And since I am one I can say this—if your mother in law or anyone else is concerned with the dust under your bed, they can come clean it while you spend time with your child!!)

However,  I do often find it contradictory that while parents keep wanting time to slow down, they do everything they can to speed up the lives of their children.  Quite often, I-phones, I-pads, laptops are owned by children before they are 2.  They are put in formal, all day learning institutions (not just day care--- school) by 3 or 4 years of age.  By 5, children are expected to behave as adults, to think as adults, to be able to comprehend as adults.  Little girls---6,7, and 8 years old---are wearing the same clothes as the teenage girls.  Teenage girls at 15 dress and try to look like they are 25.  We push our high school students to take all the courses they can, including college courses, so that they are able to graduate from college by 19 or 20.  Then we send them into the world before they are socially or emotionally ready to take on the role of adulthood.  What is the rush?  Is this perhaps why time seems to fly by?

I talked to a young father who was going to be coaching t-ball this summer about what was going to be his goal for the children. And he said, “I want them to have fun.  I don’t care if they sit and play in the grass.”  I hugged him and told him I totally agreed (I already knew he was a good guy!!).  He was right.  That is all 3-4 year olds should be worried about while playing.  Have fun and don’t get hurt or hurt somebody else.  99.9% of these kids won’t even play college ball much less make this their professions.  And that is true for all the extra curricular activities that children do.  They are probably not going to be professional singers, dancers, MMA fighters, cheerleaders or any other type of athlete.  But one day, they are going to be grown.  They are going to be out of your house.  They will grow up to be doctors, nurses, teachers, lawyers, business people, garbage men and police officers. 

So when your t-baller would rather go see the grandparents or go potty than play an inning, it will be ok.  When they are not interested in chasing after the ball, that is ok too.  Don’t jerk them into the dugout like they are old enough to understand.  When your 7-year-old decides 4 years of dance is enough for them, let them move on to something else.  And, for goodness sake, don’t so overschedule your kids so they don’t have time to be kids!  If you don’t want time to pass by so quickly, then stop, sit down, play, talk, spend time with your child.  Listen to music, talk to them about God, take them to visit their grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.  Get the idea?  You can’t slow down the movement of the clock but you can make memories now that you and your children will have in years to come.  As the parent of adult children some of the best times for me are when they say, “remember when we….?”  Or “I heard a song today and it made me think of the time we….”  Memories---make them, savor them, save them up.  One day you will be glad, so very glad, that you did.  And if time is going too quickly for you, then remember the song lyrics sung by Billy Dean that say…

“So let them be little, cause they're only that way for a while.
Give them hope, give them praise, give them love, every day.
Let em cry, let em giggle, let them sleep in the middle.
Oh, just let them be little”.

One of my favorite poems is below.  I remember reading it many years ago.  If you notice the dates of the author’s life you will see this is not a new phenomenon.

MAKING A MAN

Nixon Waterhouse (1859-1944)

Hurry the baby as fast as you can,
Hurry him, worry him, make him a man.
Off with his baby clothes, get him in pants,
Feed him on brain foods and make him advance.
Hustle him, soon as he's able to walk,
Into a grammar school; cram him with talk.
Fill his poor head full of figures and facts,
Keep on a-jamming them in till it cracks.
Once boys grew up at a rational rate,
Now we develop a man while you wait,
Rush him through college, compel him to grab,
Of every known subject a dip and a dab.
Get him in business and after the cash
All by the time he can grow a mustache.
Let him forget he was ever a boy,
Make gold his god and its jungle his joy,
Keep him a-hustling and clear out of breath,
Until he wins---nervous prostration and death.

Don’t rush those babies.  YOU slow down and it will seem that time will too.  Love them now, love them well.  Thirty years from now you will be glad you did!