I like to pride myself on being quick on the draw.  I can read the signs, pick up a quick wink, tell which way the wind is blowing.  But this time, I think I was a bit dense really.  It took the universe much longer than normal to enlighten me.  In the span of about a week, I experienced the following signs…..

1. Kulia had an assignment which required her to bring in a story about her as a baby.  Easy enough.  I just pulled up my good old blog and began surfing.  And here was my first epiphany.  I remembered the “big” stories.  Celebrations, holidays, and traveling were still in the old memory banks.  It was nice to read about these events but since I still remembered them, it wasn’t anything miraculous.  What I had forgotten was the mundane, the day to day grind, those small moments of simple bliss.  The posts about our daily routine and interactions fascinated me.  As soon as I read those old posts, the memories came flooding back.  Memories I didn’t even know I had forgotten.
2. Two days later, Uncle Dan asked if I was still writing and if I missed it.  He, too, had noticed that it’s the little simple moments that get lost in time.  They can be pinned down and preserved but if you aren’t careful they can also slid away.  I admitted that I had stopped journaling.  Mostly, I just take a picture with my phone if I want to remember something.  I have images now but no stories.
3. A week later, Jada died.  Again, I turned to this blog looking for lost memories about her.  There are a few but because I stopped writing, there aren’t many.  I know that time will rob me of her presence eventually.  Right now, she is my phantom limb.  I still glance down in the kitchen to make sure I don’t stumble over her as I cook.  I check before I scoot my chair back so I don’t hit her.  I pause to listen for her skritchy claws at the bottom of the stairs.  Eventually, I will unlearn all these behaviors and they will fade into forgotten dust.  But the real regret is that I didn’t capture them here while I could.

So OK universe.  I get it.  Stop hurting me.  I understand that this – right now – is a moment of great importance but also a moment that will fade to nothing.  That the “bigs” will live on in my photo roll but the “littles” have an awesome ephemeral power too.  I see that someday future me will need these small moments that I capture now.  She will relish them and thank me for taking the time to preserve all the uneventful, boring, useless chatter.  That any moment is worth remembering, not just the big stuff.  I need more than the images in my iCloud.  I need to be able to hear my voice talking to me from the past as well.

So hello blog.  How ya been?  Me?  I’ve been better but I think that’s a story for tomorrow.