A slice of time

One quilt from 2017, not for my granddaughter but a dear friend who welcomed her first grandchild into their family that same year.

Time's passage is often considered in decades and their multiples; five years ago my youngest granddaughter was about to enter this world. If I peruse what has occurred since, inevitably I consider my mom's death next, followed by the birth of my youngest grandson, the pandemic, our move north alongside my husband's retirement. Some big personal events within the space of a half-decade, many quilts sewn, quite a collection of words written as well. Back in 2017, I couldn't have fathomed where I would be today, not that I pondered much of what else has happened. Nor do I presume to imagine what 2027 will present. I'm more than happy to be right here, 7 December, 2022.

But I don't mind examining pictures from 2017, sometimes it's nice to peer through a momentarily opened window, breathing in what was, exhaling what has become. Grandkids were wee and when not caught up in their delightful adventures, I was writing a saga and sewing. Not all that different from what I do now, minus the descendants, but no longer are they tiny. Five years old is a watershed of sorts, that granddaughter in T-K and enjoying herself very much. She bikes to school with family and friends, loves puzzles, Legos, and My Little Pony, also enjoys collecting flower seeds and walks through the woods when they visit Humboldt. Maybe one day she'll sew a hexie flower, or write a story. The world is full of possibilities at that age.

It remains a curious realm even if you times five by ten and add one, although my granddaughter has already told me I'm old, LOL! At her age, I was surrounded by aged relatives who weren't much older than I am now and oh my goodness I thought they were ancient! Recently my husband and I have been watching Ken Burns' Baseball on the random evenings when the Golden State Warriors aren't playing. Baseball was released in the mid 1990s, and most of those offering commentary have since passed on. Many were the age I am now when the documentary was filmed, and I bet when I first watched it I thought those men and few women were, well, old. Several of them lived for a number of years after Baseball was released, and in investigating them, I was taken aback at how those who lived a long time no longer resembled who had been captured in the early 1990s. In photographs or on film/video, images don't change. We do certainly, yet in those slices of time, a face and voice remain exactly the same despite how many decades have past.

The back of the blue quilt.

We take for granted how ridiculously easy capturing images has become, phones acting as cameras stuck to our hands. But I often find that when visiting the grandkids, I take few pictures, instead rightly caught up in being with them. At times I lament the dearth of photographs, but time is better spent making memories that I hope will last longer for them than they probably do for me, hehe. Perhaps one day I'll write a novel deconstructing time's fluidity, but for now I'll revel in the expectation of spending a long weekend with beloveds. Hopefully someone will take a photo or three while we're together (insert smiley face here).