This Is The Moment We've Been Waiting For

Down the street and around the corner lives an elderly man. I would say he's in his 80's possibly a bit older. During the warm months of the year, but not the hot ones, you can almost always find him sitting on his front porch watching and waving at everyone who drives, walks, or bikes by. He doesn't have to recognize you, he waves at everyone. It's as if he has not a care in the world except to sit and enjoy life as each person passes by him. 

I often think of all the people he's seen drive by his front porch. Their seemingly busy lives. The events they've attended after passing his porch, the sadness, the happiness, the triumphs, and the losses his waves might've welcomed or bid farewell to. During the winter, I find myself missing this man on his porch and all the waves he's given as I've passed. My children even know to wave now, and they get a bit sad when he's not outside. I've decided, I want to be that man. The one on the porch. I want to be so content with life that all I want to do with my day is enjoy some nice, quiet, relaxing time sitting on my porch while watching and waving as people pass. 

We all have things we dislike about our lives or ourselves. We wish we could make more money, lose more weight, have a cleaner house, better behaved children. I'm sure there's at least one thing someone would like to improve upon (if you don't have one thing, then skip along, this blog isn't for you). Now, I'm not saying it's not healthy to want to improve yourself or your life. I'd personally love to lose a couple pounds, have a bigger/cleaner house, and obviously make more money. What I'm saying is that, maybe we need to be content enough with what we have right in front of us that spending a day on our porch doesn't throw the rest of our day/week/month out of whack. We need to spend more time living IN the moment instead of living FOR a moment that we will probably be too worried about the next moment to enjoy. 

I can't even begin to think of how many times I wished my week away for the weekend just to spend the weekend worrying about work on Monday. Or the number of times I've gone out to an event that  I've spent months looking forward to only to spend that time worrying about something else and missing the joy and happiness I could've been experiencing. 

When my son was born, my husband was in the Police Academy and gone from Sunday at 5pm to Friday at 8pm. I spent my weeks wishing for the weekend so much so that I vaguely remember what my son was like from 2 months to 6 months. Instead of enjoying the evenings I got with just me and my children, I spent most of them crying, and wishing it was over. 

I can't get those 4 months back, I never will, but I can put my foot down and say no more wishing for the next. I will begin, starting right now, living in the moment, not taking things for granted, and being content with where I am right now. This moment. I will embrace what is my life and strive to make it better while enjoying every moment I get with my beautiful family. We only get one today. One this moment. One right now. Don't worry about the next one, or you'll miss the one right in front of you.