iron chair

A corner of my mom's backyard, an antique iron chair inviting you to sit and stay a while

My dear friend Wanda (a pastor's wife) whom I met through church, has recently announced her husband is retiring. They will be moving in a little over two months. It is going to go by fast. I feel like I have taken for granted that we would always have some time to spend together, which in turn, makes me think of my mom. My mom and I were talking about taking more time to spend together. In the past, our schedules made it hard to get together until recently. With this new school year, my schedule has changed. I would get to spend time with my mom, that is, if I actually work my new schedule (I say it this way, because it has been so crazy at work that I can probably count on one hand how many times I have gotten to work MY schedule, due to working overtime). My mom plans on retiring soon. While discussing her retirement and my new schedule, we got very excited about some things that we want to do. However, her retiring got pushed forward, not once, not twice, but three times already. Before you know it, time gets busy and it has been too long since you have seen each other.
I have realized that you have to set aside for "quality" time. Otherwise, it just isn't going to happen. If something happened to my mom, I would live with so many regrets. Time is a funny thing... it gets away from you. Like all time, it has limits. The difference between the limits of time and the limits of other things is that we don't know what our time limit is. If for no other reason, this is why we should expend our time to its highest and best uses. I think about the gift of time that I had with my dad. If he had gotten into an auto accident that took his life, I would not have had that time with him. And then there is borrowed time, like my dad had when he lived longer than he was expected to.
Time is priceless. Once it is gone... it's gone.