From There to Here

The days of May are spinning away. I picture a bobbin on a sewing machine, giving over its thread to the progress of the seam. There is no stopping.

This picture was taken on our camping trip with our friends, only two weeks ago. In the odd ebb and flow of time, it already seems long ago that we pitched our tents, built the fire, and saw our children play together. And yet, like yesterday that we were college students together, when all of this life was only imagined.

As Joshua's K5 year comes galloping to a close, it has been a long journey, and a blink. It seems only an hour ago he walked away with his dad with a Darth Vader backpack and without a backward glance. And yet I know the fall festivals and chapter books and art projects and parachute play and playground heroics and heartbreak that have filled many busy days since that August morning.

We are a long way from the blueberry-eyed baby laid in my arms almost seven years ago, and for that matter, a long way from the tired and terrified mother who received him. And yet, and yet I can feel his slight weight, see his unbelievable smallness and complexity. Feel the fear and joy pounding in my veins, and how I then felt a long way from when that child was a hope, a prayer, a promise, a flutter.

The reality that gives me pause today is that despite the elasticity of my mind and heart, the odd speeding up and slowing down of memory, we are making something in these days. The bobbin spins, the stitches advance no matter how I perceive them. What am I making of these days? Is the seam straight with purpose? When I survey the endless and flying year past, I am grateful that there is another Hand at work, whose grace weaves and breathes through the moments and days, Who knows the end of the creation and is the Crafter of Love itself.