These are the days.
These are the days we talked about.
These are the days we giggled under the covers about.
These are the days we dreamed about.
My husband and I fell head over heels for each other pretty much immediately. When I say we knew, I mean we knew. My crazy husband proposed after only two months of dating and after refusing, I finally said yes just eight months later.
We were married the next year.
What I remember from those early days were endless fancy dinners, late-night drives, and motorcycle rides. But what really stands out from those early new love days were the dreams we shared.
Our conversations were filled with talks of marriage and babies, of dream farmhouse homes, and dogs running the yard.
We had so much life and imagination and what felt like everything at our fingertips.
We dreamed of these days.
And now we are living these days and they’re passing us by as we dream of other days.
Our conversations now are in passing between toddler tantrums and mama meltdowns. Our dinner conversations are stopped abruptly when our son decides to throw his mac and cheese across the room and then cry because it’s gone. As I say goodnight in our bedroom before you go park on the couch (because you stay up way later and snore way too loud) are sometimes followed by talks of bills and to-dos.
But sometimes when the moment is right and we get a second to breathe, we dream again.
We dream of paying off the house and moving south when you retire (I’m not on board but you can dream).
We talk of putting a pool in the back yard and remodeling the kitchen.
We dream of our kids growing up and the fun we’ll have one day vacationing to Disney.
We dream of future days.
But we forget to remember that we’re living our dream already.
We forget that we have a perfect little house with a large corner lot. We forget that the two crazy dogs are doing sprints in the back yard. We forget about those little footsteps chasing after us as we walk into the kitchen to grab the tenth snack this morning.
We don’t notice as we eat dinner together sometimes laughing, sometimes fighting, sometimes crying that these are those days.
These are the days we fell in love over.
Its been nearly ten years since our first date and sometimes I think back and envy the excitement and love that was overflowing from us. How carefree and young we were. I remember the thrill of not knowing what was to come but having the possibility of anything.
And I remember those conversations of our future.
But what I want us to remember as the repetitiveness of life passes us by, as the struggles seem never-ending, and as the plans of our future fill our few minutes we get of conversation is that:
These are the days.
I want to wake up every morning and take a second to soak it in. To remember the life that filled our home, the baby kisses and hugs, the excitement of a new child entering the world, and the day to day victories that seem so minor.
Because eventually when the years go by and I look back on these days, I’ll envy the love that surrounded us, the baby giggles and exhausted hugs we exchanged, I’ll remember the laughs and the sounds of cartoons filling the rooms.
I’ll remember how young and full of life we still were. How exciting every new milestone was and how nerve-racking the new big changes felt. I’ll remember the unknown of the future and the thrill of the possibilities.
I’ll remember that those were the days.
I hope you always look around you and realize the good in these days. The amazement of life in the current, and the beauty in the smallest petty tasks because at one point in your life this was your dream.
And I want you to remember to live it.
XOX), Karlene
