Ever since I can remember, I've been looking forward. Everyone does it. Eagerly anticipating the next step, the next stage, the next milestone. Parents do it with their kids from the beginning, although I'm not sure whether it's a nature or nurture thing. Do kids learn to anticipate the "next thing" in their lives by watching their parents do it, or do they simply have an inherent instinct to be impatient for tomorrow to arrive.
Moms and Dads can't wait for Baby's birth. Then look forward to the first smile, the first laugh, the first tooth, the first solids, the first unassisted sitting, the first standing-ups, the first steps, the first words. From the time my niece learned to talk, when people asked her how old she was she'd say "ahmot toooo" which meant almost two. She had long abandoned her first year in favor of the next one.
People can't wait until kids are out of diapers, next thing you know they're going to preschool then kindergarten. When you're in primary school you can't wait to be a big kid, when you're in middle school you desperately crave high school life, once you're in high school it's all about preparing for college. Then, at college, if you don't get too wrapped up in parties and drinking and sex, you aim for that four-year goal: graduation. Finally, a real adult in the real world. Unless you just can't get enough matriculation, or you just don't want to grow up just yet, or you want to make yourself more marketable and boost your paycheck—and go to grad school or a professional program.
Let's say you land that first post-college job. Then, for many, it's one rung after another on the corporate ladder, step by step by step, to top brass in your field.
Somewhere in there, you start ticking off accomplishments in your personal life: from first crush as a youngster to first love to first lover to first rebound relationship to marriage proposal to engagement to marriage to first house. Then, as you're ticking off those accomplishments, your biological clock starts tick-tocking away. Trying to get pregnant, getting pregnant, marking off the stages from zygote to embryo to fetus to birth.
If you're lucky and blessed, so the cycle goes...
I don't want to countdown the next 30 years, desperately longing for retirement (for one reason, without Social Security, I'm not sure anyone will be retiring anymore). Then what? The move to the retirement community? Then to the assisted living center, then to the nursing home? When will my teeth fall out? When will I break my hip? And we all know where it goes from there.
So I'm going to start a list of stuff to do between now and retirement. I'd like to fill my days with more than the same old, same old day after day, month after month, year after year, for a lifetime. I'll ponder and come up with my list in the days to come. Stay tuned. In the meantime, maybe you'll start your own.
Moms and Dads can't wait for Baby's birth. Then look forward to the first smile, the first laugh, the first tooth, the first solids, the first unassisted sitting, the first standing-ups, the first steps, the first words. From the time my niece learned to talk, when people asked her how old she was she'd say "ahmot toooo" which meant almost two. She had long abandoned her first year in favor of the next one.
People can't wait until kids are out of diapers, next thing you know they're going to preschool then kindergarten. When you're in primary school you can't wait to be a big kid, when you're in middle school you desperately crave high school life, once you're in high school it's all about preparing for college. Then, at college, if you don't get too wrapped up in parties and drinking and sex, you aim for that four-year goal: graduation. Finally, a real adult in the real world. Unless you just can't get enough matriculation, or you just don't want to grow up just yet, or you want to make yourself more marketable and boost your paycheck—and go to grad school or a professional program.
Let's say you land that first post-college job. Then, for many, it's one rung after another on the corporate ladder, step by step by step, to top brass in your field.
Somewhere in there, you start ticking off accomplishments in your personal life: from first crush as a youngster to first love to first lover to first rebound relationship to marriage proposal to engagement to marriage to first house. Then, as you're ticking off those accomplishments, your biological clock starts tick-tocking away. Trying to get pregnant, getting pregnant, marking off the stages from zygote to embryo to fetus to birth.
If you're lucky and blessed, so the cycle goes...
But after you've got the job and the partner and the kid and the house with the picket fence and the pet and the perfect life...what next? Do you get a different job? Do you live through your kids and countdown the days to their milestones until they're where you are? Do you wake up one day and wonder what you're looking forward to anymore?
I don't want to countdown the next 30 years, desperately longing for retirement (for one reason, without Social Security, I'm not sure anyone will be retiring anymore). Then what? The move to the retirement community? Then to the assisted living center, then to the nursing home? When will my teeth fall out? When will I break my hip? And we all know where it goes from there.
So I'm going to start a list of stuff to do between now and retirement. I'd like to fill my days with more than the same old, same old day after day, month after month, year after year, for a lifetime. I'll ponder and come up with my list in the days to come. Stay tuned. In the meantime, maybe you'll start your own.
Comments
Avril Lavigne is coming to Moline in July.
Oh and now I am "ahmoht" 24. Eek!