linear

 the other day i went to do a physical exam for one of my long term care patients at a nursing home. she has dementia. she was sitting on the edge of her bed, wrapped only in her fleece blanket eating her breakfast and somehow she looked very appropriate, even regal - blanket tucked under her arms with her exposed shoulders. a 'couldn't-be-bothered' elegance. i complemented her haircut and said it made her look younger. she asked me how old she was, because she had forgotten. i said, you're 85 years old. she looked at me, her expression somewhere between amused and unnerved. no. that can't be she shook her head. i checked my dates she did look younger than 85, no you were born in 1937 right? that's right. well it's now 2022 so that makes you 85. but i haven't even born any children yet. she had this look like someone who had time traveled - or rip van winkle - awoken into a new reality and missed a large portion of life. behind her was her family portrait all 5 kids smiling beside her and their spouses and her grandkids. there was a big pause. a space. her memory betrays her.  time is already a complicated thing even before dementia.

i can appreciate the shock of time. today i took jude on our first college tour together. why it was just last week he learned to ride his bike down our dirt driveway in uganda, and the day before that we were in atlanta and he learned to swim and graduated from preschool, standing taller than the other kids in his stripped rugby shirt singing their italian song holding a yellow flower on stage. i promise, it was literally last week.  

and when i stop now and think of those milestones, the balance needed for the body on a bike, or to dare to float and move through water with just your skinny child arms and kicking legs- did i pay attention? or was i figuring out what to make for dinner? and what else did i miss?

life is so amazing. how it goes on linearly. no matter what. there are no options to change this. my boy who knew himself well enough to run right off the t ball field during warm up laps and into the car on the first day of practice, is the same guy who knows what he wants to study and what size school he wants. he is not one to look around for everyone's approval or reaction- he knows what works for him. and he checks only his internal moral compass - i'm so proud of him for that. 

one of the strange things about life with zoe is how time can feel more like a loop than linear. we circle back around. ground hog day. we can feel like we are on repeat. maybe this is why it's feels new and surprising with jude. he's actually going to launch in a way that zoe won't. it's more evident with the milestones. others milestones. the weekend her best childhood friend graduated from an ivy league university, i helped zoe in the shower and combed out her hair with 'no more tangles' while she watched 'Go Diego Go' wearing her 'Aristocats' t-shirt before we drove her back to her program.there is a timelessness to zoe that is painful and yet i cherish it. zoe has the gift of moments. she lives in them, fully. she doesn't wonder if she was present because she is all in.

jude's linear path has been very classic, if anything accelerated. he had to be the oldest of the siblings when he followed her by 5 years. i remember him answering her first grade math problems when he was 2  because he had learned counting and was hovering around the table while she was melting down. it has been him who had to watch out for her, not the other way around. yet this is who he is- for good and bad, it's shaped him.and who his is, is wonderful.

today i look at him, up at him, all 6 feet and 8 inches of him, and see him knowing himself in a world where that has become harder to do than i think it was for me. i see him caring for the world around him and wanting to make it better and to find his way to do that. he has a soft spot for people who aren't always linear in time,  who may get stuck in loops, but he's learned his boundaries probably better than i have mine. today i was in the background, observing his engagement with his next steps and i know he'll be just fine.