The swings have taught me so much. Yes, I'm talking about the playground equipment. And no, I'm not crazy. They actually have taught me a lot. Let me explain by telling you a little story ...
...all about how my life got flipped, turned upside down...
...not that one.
When I was probably 4 or 5, I really got into going on the swings. Before I had always been a bit afraid, because of my fear of heights, but around that time I just kind of forgot about it. Ah, to be able to forget things as easily as I did as a child. Any who, the only problem with going on the swings was that I was too short to be able to push myself. I was teeny. The only way my feet could touch the ground was if my bum wasn't on the seat. Not really productive to the whole riding a swing thing, huh? Therefore, I always had to have someone to push me. If I did not have someone with me (or someone who just didn't want to push me...I'm looking at you, big bro), then basically it was a no go for the swings. From that moment on, I couldn't wait to be tall enough to go on the swing. I kept wishing and waiting for it to come.
And finally, it did. A couple years later my legs had decided to grow and I was able to sit on the swing seat and touch my feet to the ground. Huzza! It felt oh so sweet to be able to do this myself, to be able take myself to new heights and see over buildings. It was truly amazing.
But after only a little while of doing this, I realized that I missed the old way of being on the swings. Of having team work with another person to get me to go higher and higher on the swings. And to be honest, I missed that I could kind of be lazy sometimes because someone else was pushing me. And though at my 7 or 8 years I did not realize it, the swings had truly taught me some things.
They taught me to not wish away my life and instead live for the moment because one day, you may wish you had it back. If we don't enjoy where we are, when we're there and instead yearn for the future, we're going to one day realize what we missed and yearn for the past. And what kind of life is that? Life goes by so crazy fast that if we don't enjoy it, it'll be gone before we know it. I know it's hard to do ( heck, I still have trouble) but I think if we all tried to do it, we'd be much better off.
The swings also made me see a parallel between my younger and older self. The shorter version of me is me when I was a child/teenager. Still literally feels like yesterday that I was playing hopscotch or prepping for my driver's test. But in reality, I was finishing a final research paper and driving around a HUGE (okay, maybe huge to me) city with little to no ease. So the taller me is my grown up self. I'm a grown up. Feels so weird to type that and I'm not sure when that happened, but I'm an adult. I'm going to doctor's appointments, job interviews, paying for my own gas and housing and buying my own food. I'm no longer the short little girl who needed help on the swings; I'm the taller girl making things happen for herself. Its weird. But good.
So what I want you take away from this is that yes, there is always a better tomorrow. But sometimes there is good "right now, right this minute" that we should all embrace. There is nothing wrong with hoping for the future or reliving the past, but there is a present we need to acknowledge too. Because, hey, the present was once the future and will be the past, so might as well make the most of it while we've got it!
Over and Meowt,
Marli J
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