TIME, WHEN YOU’RE YOUNG, seems to pass slowly. You’re waiting, always waiting. To turn another year older. To master a skill. To gain independence. To do whatever seems so important you wonder how you can possibly wait for another day or week or month to pass.
Now I wish time would slow down. But it can’t and it won’t and so I accept the reality of time passing, of aging, of days disappearing too quickly. Of celebrating my 50-year high school class reunion this year. Of my youngest turning thirty. Of me nudging seventy.
In a recent conversation with a beloved aunt, she shared that she can’t believe how old her nieces and nephews are, considering she’s only twenty-nine. I love that about Aunt Dorothy, who has always and forever declared herself on the cusp of thirty while in reality she’s closing in on ninety. I like her thinking.
By happenstance, I picked up a children’s picture book at my local library a few weeks ago that focuses on time. I’m not trying to go back in time to my childhood. Rather, I enjoy books written for kids. Many hold important messages and beautiful art that resonate with me. I highly-recommend you check out recently-published children’s picture books to see how they’ve evolved over the decades into some timely masterpieces of words and art.
Among the books I selected was Time Is a Flower, written and illustrated by Julie Morstad of Vancouver, British Columbia. In her opening page, Morstad writes of time as a clock, as a calendar, in the traditional ways we consider time.
But then the book unfolds, page by page, into time comparisons that are simplistic, everyday, ordinary, unremarkable. Yet remarkable in the way Morstad presents them with sparse words and bold art. If I could rip the pages from her book, I would frame her illustrations of a sunset reflected in sunglasses; a child’s long wavy locks woven with bird, butterfly and flower; and a wiggly tooth in a gaping mouth.
Time is the moments, the memories. The details. Not necessarily the extraordinary. That is the message I take from Morstad’s book. Appreciate the caterpillar, not just the butterfly. Appreciate the seed, not just the flower. Value the slant of sunlight across the floor, and the shadows, too.
As I consider Time Is a Flower, I think of my dear aunt half a country away in New Jersey. Too many years have passed since I’ve seen Aunt Dorothy, so long that I can’t recall the last time we embraced. But I hold memories of her, of our time together. She was the young aunt who arrived from the Twin Cities with discarded jewelry and nail polish for me and my sisters. She was the aunt who called her husband, “My Love,” an endearing name that imprinted upon me her deep love for Uncle Robin (who died in January). She is the aunt who took me into New York City when I was a junior in college visiting her on spring break. She is the aunt who, for my entire life, has called me “My Little Princess.”
Yes, time passes too quickly. The clock ticks. Days on the calendar advance. Years pass.
But within each day, seconds and minutes and hours remain. Time to live. Time to love. And time to remember that time is like a flower. Sprouting. Growing. Blooming. Dying. Time is a moment, until it’s a memory.
NOTE: Remember, this Sunday, March 10, time changes as we shift to daylight savings time in the U.S. We lose an hour of time as we spring forward.
© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
Minnesota Prairie Roots 
Your Aunt Dorothy sounds absolutely lovely. What great memories you have of time with her. I hope you can see her sometime and give her a big hug.
She wants to fly to Minnesota this summer for a visit family. But, in reality, I don’t know if that will happen. Dorothy has always been a dear aunt to me.
I look forward to the adventure and the journey more than the destination now. I think about living life in chapters and moments and seasons. I have to let go of more and more and unwrap this precious gift called life every day and just savor and soak it in 🙂 Rushing about and the crazy busyness and the everything is urgent and important is not what matters. It is TIME and making space for ourselves to find that child like spirit of play and laughing and ALL OF THE FUN STUFF!!! Like your recent posts put the tech down and break out a puzzle, read or plant, et. al. Happy Day – ENJOY
Renee, your approach to time is one we should all strive to follow. Savor the moment. Stop rushing. And, yes, put down the tech.
Lovely and poetic. Time is something we never seem to have enough of. It is so very precious, especially as we become grandparents, and it dawns on us how fast children grow up. There are mornings, I wait to hear my little boy jump out of bed, run down the hall, and tell me he has a great idea. And then I realize he’s a grown man who lives on the other side of the country… It happened so fast.
Oh, Rose, your comment resonates with me. My little boy is also a grown man now living half way across the country in Boston. Where is your little boy? I would very much like him with his great ideas.
You’re right in that grandchildren make us realize how quickly time flies. I think we were too busy as young moms with our own to realize that. Or at least I was much of the time.
What lovely writing about time. It is precious. Plus as one gets older, it goes too fast!
Thank you, Colleen. Yes, time flies, especially now in our golden age.
Loved the reminders of time : ” A time for everything , and a season for everything under the heavens.” Ecclesiastes
The photos were so nice too. Loved the prairie sunset.!!!
Have a great day today !! KathyG
Kathy, that Ecclesiastes reference is so fitting for this post. I love that Scriptural poetry. Glad you enjoyed the prairie sunset. It is one of the beauties I miss most about my native sw Minnesota.
I so agree with you on this, and I will look for this book ,it sounds lovely. like you, I simply love children’s books and collect them. they have so much to say in so little space. each word and image in so important. the illustrations are often stunning, and the messages strong. I always tell my class that I’m in my 90s, adding 30 years to my age, to help them to see generations more clearly, if they directly ask me if it’s true, I will say no, I’m in my 60s, but want you to see that I am older, but still doing the same job. age and number do not matter.I work with an assistant in her 40s, and a teaching partner in her 20s, and it all must be confusing. one day, a child said, you are the grandma of our room, she is the mom, and she is the sister, pointing to my fellow teachers, and I could not have said it better.
That child got it right. Gotta love a little one who thinks like that and then expresses herself.
I like your saying Time is a moment, until it’s a memory.
Time is precious and I try to savor each day but of course, don’t always get it right.
It’s good to be reminded often to do so.
I think we all need to pause sometimes in the busyness of life and simply appreciate the moment we are in, the time we have.
Another lovely post Audrey. Your aunt sounds like a delightful woman and I love her outlook on age. The UK is already 5 hours ahead of USA, but we aren’t changing our clocks until the end of the month-time is a peculiar concept! Here today, it’s Mothering Sunday, also called Mother’s Day, held the 4th Sunday of Lent, so it moves around every year. May I wish you a joyful early celebration of motherhood for today, and of springtime.
Thank you, Judith, for appreciating my writing and for your wonderful wishes of celebrating motherhood and spring.