the charmed years

a multitude of thoughts swirling round my head tonight and i've been having trouble sleeping so i thought maybe a free-writing blog entry would help me clear my mind. i just got back from hearing amy's band-it was lovely. i got nostalgic again because i sat next to her mom and thought about how amy will be moving soon and that she may not get to play with this particular set of people again. and i watched all the beautiful recent grads and the couples...and the parents of one of the other band members sat with their son's girlfriend and i noticed how nice the mom was being to her...and i thought "i'm going to be bad at this." at the letting go part. at the being the boyfriend's mom part. at the part where i have to live out the concept which i tell myself often but perhaps don't always believe-that these kids are not really "mine" at all. and so i came home. and i went into their rooms to check on them as always and i gazed down on them a little longer than usual and my heart hurt knowing how much i need to be appreciating this brief period in their lives and how often i fall short of that.
matt often says that these are the charmed years--right now we're in good health, our children love us like no other, all the members of our immediate families are alive. this is no small miracle and we need to celebrate every day that we can. and a part of me, the part that's afraid, just wants to hold on tightly to this. but all we can do is live and to trust that when the bad times come God will be right there seeing us through.