Those Moments When

Moments are funny things. They can be as fleeting as a passing thought, or as long as the ten seconds that felt like an eternity when you forgot your words on stage. They can be light and fluffy and nonsensical, or heavy realizations you never thought you’d actually stumble across – those cliché moments you’ve heard about, seen illustrated, but never lived; Moments that can make life worth living, while simultaneously making things undeniably real and present.

Those moments when you realize your parents aren’t your perfect superhero’s; When a plastic ball pit becomes a germ-invested booger-fest rather than an endless sea of bottomless fun; When your dream job becomes something that will help you live first, and make you happy second; When saving money isn’t easy because you need to pay bills and eat and live; When you can no longer eat whatever you want without actually focusing on exercising because metabolism is a real thing, and it does catch up with you; When you don’t marry your first love; When you realize you can’t actually have an apartment like Rachel and Monica did, because in New York City, it would cost over $10,000 a month– and not a lot of people make that; When you start thinking about having to take care of your parents, and how on earth you are going to be able to do that when you can just take care of yourself; When the Naked Cowboy in Times Square doesn’t seem like a fun tourist attraction, but a million health violations waiting to happen (no, I will not touch him); When you hope your grandmother will be around long enough to see you walk down the aisle and dance at your wedding; When you walk through Forever 21 and feel old because most of the dresses don’t really fit on your hips correctly; When you have hips; When you move past your first job, feeling jaded by an experience and hoping it doesn’t effect you going forward; When it absolutely effects you going forward; When a productive weekend means you cleaned your entire apartment, did laundry, and went food shopping; When you realize you are growing up.

I have made the startling realization that I am doing just that - growing up.  It's not that I'm unhappy about it.  On the contrary, I'm actually enjoying it all.  This isn't to say that I'm not going to run barefoot through an open fire hydrant, or do cartwheels down the beach and run into the ocean.  It's just that now, these moments count more.  I recognize how fortunate I am to have opportunities to play and leap, take off for a weekend here and there, adopt a cat or get a piercing.  Perhaps they are just more meaningful now.  Or maybe, I'm just appreciating the little things.  I like appreciating the little things.