Sunrise sunset

Swiftly flow the days.

Yesterday one of my students asked me, "What's next on the list?"

Um.

She said, "You know, Valentine's Day then..."

"Oh.  St. Patrick's Day is the next holiday."

Later in the day another one wondered if we were halfway through the school year yet.  I said, "More than halfway."

That was met with exclamations of either glee or sadness.  It depended on the student.

Time is skipping right along.

Mark's show is over and fingers crossed we have more time together.  It is lighter later and earlier as we're heading toward spring.

All the routines and mundane tasks and milestones and performances and garbage cans to drag to the street and bills to pay and laundry to fold and dishwasher to empty add up to time passed.

Lately Adam and I have been talking about the unsettling reality of four seniors next year.  Braeden and Anna and Emma are all planning to graduate from BYU and Mark from high school.  The what's next beyond that is almost entirely out of our hands which feels weird.

I mean, haven't we been in charge all these years?

Adam pointed out to me that just how you have to set expectations before you need them in parenting because you don't know when it's too late, you have to figure out when to back off and how much to back off when they're staring down adulthood.  The reaction singed into us is to intervene and give advice and/or instructions.  It takes skills I have yet to hone to step back and let them do their thing sans comments from me.

Is this the little girl I carried?
It this the little boy at play?
I don't remember growing older,
When did they?

When did she get to be a beauty?
When did he grow to be so tall?
Wasn't it yesterday when they were small?

Sunrise sunset, sunrise, sunset,
Swiftly flow the days,
Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers,
Blossoming even as they gaze...