This is a tale that happened to one of my comrades a few weeks back. It is an important reminder that sometimes we get so caught up in the minutia of our day, we neglect those things that matter the most.
One evening, my friend, who was in a great mood after a few cocktails at dinner with the gals, came bouncing in the house to give her husband an enthusiastic hello. There he sat, arms crossed, eyes focused on the tv. ”What did you do today,” he curtly asked her. She proceeded to recount the details of her day (still giddy from a couple glasses of rose’)…..dropped the kids of at school, business breakfast, errands etc. His response was,” That takes you up until about 1pm, what else?” “Hmm,” she replied. “Well…..maybe I did a little shopping on Montana and met a friend for coffee.” “Now you’re talkin,” he said. Turns out the security cameras in their house had frozen that day and, while fixing them, he decided to watch the household comings and goings from morning till night. He informed his wife, (who at that point he was calling MOTY….mother of the year), that she neglected to mention the Intermix bags she strolled in with, didn’t pick up the kids from school, and spent a total of 45 seconds “glancing” at her son’s homework while “yakking” on the phone. He tallyed up the total amount of quality time she had spent with her children that day, and it wasn’t a pretty picture. She took his statistics in stride, and promised that the next day would be better. And it was!
What we need to gleen from this, is that our time with our precious children is fleeting. Before we know it, they will be out of the house and people we see on holidays and special occasions. They will have their own lives, and have less and less time for us. Nothing is more important that these moments we have with our family, no matter how mundane homework and carpool can be. This is what we (and they) will remember, not the shopping, charity lunches and unnecessary errands.