It was a fair question. We'd spent time apart, experiencing our days, going about our business, spending time with friends, co-workers, teachers. We must have learned something that day, right?
I got pretty typical shoulder shrug responses. Nuthin', they'd say. I knew they were wrong, of course. How could anyone go to school all day and not learn something they didn't know before they walked through the front door of that school in the morning?
But as they were going through their daily routine, it seemed like it was always the same kind of things they were experiencing. I'd do the same thing with my work. I'd go through the rituals involved in working in a printing plant. Make a buck, figure out ways to avoid boredom, don't get hurt, make everything right, work at a high level of competence and productivity, meet or exceed expectations. Go home, pick up the kids, cook some dinner, watch a ballgame, read stories.
Every once in a while something interesting, something out of the ordinary, would occur. Something big would capture our attentions for an hour or two or a day or two. We would process the event and go back to our routines.
Then we started waiting for big things to happen and forgot about the daily events that we were experiencing. Ignoring the seemingly unimportant daily matters. Pushing the routines way down the Priority List. Anticipating that Next. Big. Deal.
As I've lived this life of mine I've gotten to a point where I realize that the daily things are just as life altering as the big moments. It's something that I've known for a long time, really. I've known a lot of things for a long time. I've forgotten a lot of things for a long time, too. But I've gotten to this really interesting time of my life. I've grasped a certain understanding of how things work (or don't), of where I fit, my little cog in the Big Machine. I've gained a certain knowledge of who I am, where I've been and where I'm heading.
It's a comfortable feeling. A contentment.
It's called getting old, right???
Ha!
That's OK. That is what it is, after all. Travel around the sun fifty or sixty times and one does learn a few things. The perspective of age does that to a person. One sees the bigger picture. One experiences life's beginnings, middles and ends and can see the whole story arc. Youth isn't wasted on the young. It's right where it should be. And retirement isn't wasted on the old, either!
So the little things matter. As much as the big things. No more, no less.
Remember to enjoy the view!!
