My daughter is turning 18 soon. University next year. Sob.
When they say the days are long and the years are short, they mean it.
Of course I'm excited for her, to watch her stretch her wings, take flight, and flourish.
There's a line that goes around Instagram: "You only have 18 summers with them." God, I hate that. The truth is you have as many summers as they choose to have with you. Hopefully it's more.
And that's where "choose" becomes painful.
You look back, and you think, and hope. God, I hope she chooses me. And you remember all the times you weren't present for her because life got in the way. The cooking. The cleaning. The mental load. The never-ending list of things that, frankly, don't matter.
Because when you get to where I am, on the cusp of watching your child leave the nest, you think: I want more now. I wanted more then. I want more summers with my child. I wanted to be present. I wanted to be attuned. I wanted to hold those precious years in the palm of my hand and clasp them to my heart. So she chooses me. So I can show up and be the parent I want to be. Not so I can have a clean kitchen.
When I first held her: the traumatic delivery, the NICU, the bewilderment of being a first-time parent with no family nearby, the sleepless nights, the exhaustion, the boredom, if I'm honest, of being home with a baby. I willed the time to pass faster. It's hard to admit that now, looking back over those seventeen and a half years.
I want to go back and do it all over again. But knowing what I know now, those moments? They're golden. They're fleeting. You think your cup runs over with time. It doesn't. Time keeps pouring moments in, but the older they get, the more of those moments don't land in your cup.
I'd go back and be more present. The laundry, the cleaning, all of it can wait. I wish I'd had more time to just be with her. I would have hired exactly the kind of person I'm trying to build with Ayi.
It's the service I wanted and needed when my kids were younger, and honestly, I still need it now. My daughter has another year at home before university. My younger one, thirteen, still has years ahead of her under this roof. And that time is precious. For their sakes, and for our own, we deserve to treasure it.
Ayi: more time for what matters