Time marches on its stomach

It's not so much that I'm hungry, although I was about half an hour ago, it's that this past weekend made me think about time. About time passing, and the things that always indicate that time is passing.

Like birthdays. Baby E, my very own nephew and the best one I have, had his first birthday yesterday. How this happened, I don't even know. But as I thought about getting the news exactly one year ago, it made me all sappy. Although the story itself is kind of funny. The short version is that I had been hounding L with daily calls. She wasn't planning on telling us when she went into labor (???) so I had to take matters into my own hands. And call her incessantly. I had just talked to her on a Friday night and she was seeing no action. Which is why I couldn't believe it when I saw I had missed a call from her husband on Saturday afternoon. If you wonder why in the world I would have missed the call, I'll tell you. It's because I was at Cedar Point riding roller coasters with my boyfriend. Naturally. My sister was giving birth, and I was living it up on The Millennium. (Sometimes I wonder whose experience was more horrific.) When I called back and B told me I was the aunt of a bouncing baby boy, it was just about the best news I'd ever received. And now he's 1.

Like graduations. I drive to and from church the same way every week, but once in a blue moon I take an alternate way. It's not faster, it's just different, and I felt the need to make yesterday one of those 'different' kind of days and take the alternate route. And of course it would figure that the one day I choose to drive past the university circle is the very day (and time) that graduation is going on. I was stuck, not moving, for quite a while. And yet I think there was a reason for this, some sort of inspiration that caused the detour, because I became all sappy once again just seeing those caps and gowns. I guess sometimes, in moments when you feel like your life will never change from what it is now, you miss what it's like to wonder what life will hold for you. Which is why I'm grateful for the chance I had yesterday to remember that I still wonder.

Like re-signing your lease. I've been in my house 2 years, and while I'm perfectly content, I've been feeling strangely antsy. As if I should be looking around just in case there's something out there I'd like better. (Yikes! I'm starting to sound like one of my exes and his relationship strategy.) But looking around only reminded me of what I already knew: Cleveland is so ghetto. I did find and consider an adorable house in Richie Rich-ville. But the lawn was big (we all know how I feel about mowing) and I just couldn't stomach paying Richie Rich-ville prices. I looked at a second house, not in Richie Rich-ville but in very nice area nonetheless, and was very encouraged by the initial pictures. And even more encouraged when the owner turned out to be Hottie McHot. I shook his hand and actually had to bite my tongue to keep from saying "where do I sign?" But the encouragement ends there. Not only was the house not nearly as upkept as it should have been, but it was only feet away from the city cemetery. Methinks not. I drove home as sure as ever that I've got a good thing going where I am.

Like the anniversary of burning your leg off. But I won't get into that now. It needs its own post anyway.

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