Woman in the Middle

Watching Dancing with the Stars is my guilty pleasure right now. I tape it and enjoy it at off times during the day, when I eat lunch or need a break. This week the theme was “Most Memorable Year.” It got me thinking. What would I call my most memorable year?

As you can imagine, it is the difficult things that stick in the mind most. Our human brains seem to be wired that way.  Maybe that is to make sure our ancient ancestors didn’t forget to avoid tigers, or run off a cliff, or something else life threatening. Who knows. But when I looked back, first thoughts went to those I have lost and difficult times. Of course, I have had many many good things happen as well. The good far outweighs the bad. As I dug deeper into the memory bank I came up with weddings and births and family vacations and graduations and trips with friends.

I dug a little deeper and came up with  even smaller events that made me smile like board games with Brother Dear, which always seemed to bring out the funniest side of him. What can I say, the word “gallbladder” will always make me smile after a memorable game of Apples to Apples with him. Or there was that time Blackie got a plastic bag stuck around him and went racing all over the house with us chasing him. Or Hubby chasing Honey all around the back yard, her mouth and tongue hanging out in a giant doggie smile. There was holding my first book in my hands for the first time.

In the end, however, I decided that the most memorable year is this one. It is always the one I am living right now. The past is a wonderful photo album, but the present is just that – a present I get to unwrap every day. It is moments like yesterday when I got to see Eldest Daughter’s joy when she received the biggest pay check in her life after a week and a half of  very hard work.  It was hearing the joy in Youngest Daughter’s voice as she described the fun things she is going to do on her upcoming trip to visit friends in San Francisco. It was the email I got this morning from a long time friend, which told me the trip I proposed with her to the Carolinas was the EXACT same trip she and her boyfriend had talked about taking, because great minds think alike!

The past was wonderful. But the present will always be where I chose to be.

In 2007, we had a memorable trip to Australia. One thing that I will never forget is the girls watching Big Brother Australia every night in our room. They have never watched the American version, before or since, which we still laugh about. Maybe it was those Australian accents that made it so enjoyable…..