I know something for sure. My life often does not go just the way I envision it.

Take this past week for example.

Last Sunday, we celebrated my husband’s 51st birthday. 

We all consider him our biggest special occasion shopping challenge.  For one thing, when he needs or wants something, he usually just goes and gets it.  It puts us in a tough spot, because when it comes to him, we all really WANT to do special things.  Because he does so much for us.

We had a special little getaway planned for his birthday celebration, and we did all manage to come up with some wrappable gifts.  That still didn’t feel like “enough” to me, though, so I also started writing a piece about him and birthdays.  All the ones we have spent together (Over 30-years’ worth!); my memories of them; all the ways in which life has changed over all those years.  I wrote with hope in my heart of creating a special, lasting memento in time for this birthday.   

When we left for our getaway on Thursday, I had the long, unedited version spilled onto the pages.  I thought that between then and his birthday on Sunday, I stood a realistic chance of stealing a few minutes here and a few there to edit it and publish it on his birthday.

That did not go the way I’d envisioned it. 

Instead, real moments happened – one after the other; opportunities to enjoy that trip. A place we love.  People I love. Several times, I had the choice:  A few minutes alone to write - or saying “yes” when my people asked me to do whatever came next.  I chose saying yes to my people every time.  Participating in the present moments – making new memories together – felt more important than spending the time writing about moments from the past.    

Even as I consciously made those choices, I recognized how much I have changed.  I look back on many times in my life and see where, focused so intently on the exact outcome I had pictured, I sacrificed moments I was actually living. 

I can’t change the past, but I have decided to do better in the present.

We had the nicest weekend.  One that, aside from a general idea of the number of days we planned to stay, we otherwise approached with no plans.  Something else I once would never have done – but that I have discovered I really love.    

We spent the time with our kids, our puppy, a couple of our dearest friends, and their almost identical (but older-by-a-couple-of-years) puppy.  Easy, relaxed days and evenings.  Laughter and nonsense one minute; great conversations the next. 

One such great conversation materialized around the question,

“If, for the rest of your life, you could have just one more thing… anything you want… what would you want?” 

Thinking back now to the answer that popped out of my mouth, I see another sharp contrast between “me” today and previous versions of “me”…

Maybe the time I spent writing about my husband’s birthdays and all we have experienced together has me reflecting a little more than usual on how much we have changed:  Not overnight, and usually not easily.  But I also look at most of the ways in which I can recognize that I have changed and say, “Thank God.”  The girl I was 30-years ago tried her best and had good intentions for life.  She also had no idea how much she just didn’t know yet! 

In the opening paragraphs of that birthday piece (the one that never ended up seeing the light of day…), I started 30-years back. I described how, once upon a time, my husband had been the “center of my world”.  The story expanded and shifted – to where our kids eventually became the center of our mutual world.  All true.  Understandable?  Maybe even familiar?  Only, when I write that now, it makes me cringe a little.  Designating any human as the “center of my world” puts way too much pressure on them!  The “me” of yesteryear probably considered living my life that way the mark of a good wife and mother.  Today, however, after having lived and learned from a whole lot of Real Life, I realize where my only hope of being a good wife and mother has always come from:  God.  Keeping Him at the true center of my world.  Recognizing those loved ones as the greatest gifts He has placed in my life.  Remembering that He wants me to rely on Him – every day; trusting Him to guide me in the ways He intends to make me a gift in their lives.

It has taken me a long time to learn that, and a lot of other things, too.      

…When asked that, “If you could have anything” question, I answered without a single bit of hesitation.  

Then, I immediately wondered if I should have thought it through a little better:  I really would love to have, for instance, a beautiful chef’s kitchen in my house...  Maybe even several bedrooms and bathrooms where anyone could comfortably stay as a guest in our home at any given time...   

But I actually said, “I have everything I want.  I don’t need another thing.  All I really want is to write and publish a book.”

When I talk about second-guessing my answer, I do so in jest.  Life so far has taught me, through some experience and much example, that it doesn’t matter how many things we ever have or don’t have – we can always, given enough time, think of more to want.  I am thankful that my answer came out the way it did:  Genuine and true.  That I now notice and believe in what really matters to me – regardless of whether it makes sense to anyone else.  Yet another change in me. 

…At the beginning of our weekend, thinking of all I hoped we might do together, I commented to my daughter, “Maybe Daddy and I can get a good picture…” 

He and I did more memorable things this past summer than we have done in years.  Ironically, though, the only actual photo evidence we possess to document our mutual presence on any of our adventures exists in the form of selfies.  The way old people take them.  Which looks nothing like practiced, artful way young people know how to take them.

(…. For that reason, I will 1000% always be that person who sees a couple or a family trying to take a selfie in a special place and walks up to offer, “Would you like me to take that for you?” The last time I did that, the couple politely declined.  That’s when I realized I am also “that person”:  The one living in pandemical times but not thinking about the fact that they probably don’t want this unfamiliar weirdo touching their phone… What can I say?  I tell you the Real Life stuff here...)

Our lack of photos reminded me of yet another major contrast between the present and the past.  For so many years, getting the “good picture” would have been a priority for me.  Certainly not an optional afterthought.  Ostensibly as a memory.  Brutally honestly, though?  Far too often as something to post. 

As further proof of how much has changed, even though my daughter and I agreed we should make a point of taking one, we never did.  Instead, we lived fully present in moments of that weekend – just as we were.  Naturally, we snapped some photos along the way to keep as memories, but we never spent time trying to take a “nice” one. 

In fact at one point, with at least four adult humans involved in trying to get one good photo of the two cute dogs (exponentially harder to photograph than two toddlers), we all shared a laugh and a shake of our heads when the conversation turned to ‘”Instagram vs. Reality.” 

Real Life rarely looks the way the things we post make it look.  I wish everyone – especially the youngest among us – truly understood and kept that in mind.

We did take one spur of the moment photo as a family of four.  My son-in-law snapped it.  For it to have qualified as a true family photo, he should have been in it.  As should have our puppy.  I hadn’t washed my hair that day, and I wore the same boating cover-up clothes I had worn the day before.  I once would have allowed the way I felt I looked to stop me from even taking that photo – let alone posting it.  How sad to have ever lived that way.  Our adult children cared enough to take time out of their lives and spend the weekend with us. Why would I miss a chance to capture that memory?  We took the photo, and at the end of (not during!) a beautiful day, I posted it.

My husband’s Real Life Happy Birthday. 

No finished written tribute.  No fixed-up wife.  (Beautiful kids, but they just can’t help that!) …Also, no misery taking 50 photos to get one “good” one!  Just a truly good day – a whole good weekend - doing what we love with people we love. 

I don’t take as many pictures or think as much about “sharing” our life as I used to, but I still do one thing I never want to stop doing:

Somehow, everywhere we go, I always manage to leave last.  I take one final walk through whatever accommodations have just played host to our vacation, special occasion, or whatever event has taken us away from home.  For one thing, I make sure that nobody forgot anything. But so long ago, I began to recognize so many of those times as future precious memories.  Somewhere along the line, on that last walk through, I started saying a silent prayer of thanks to God:  For the time He just gave us.  For the memories we made.  I ask Him to protect us and take us safely home.  To take care of us all, and if He sees fit, to bring us all back there to do it again someday.  I have seen life change in so many ways and with very little notice.  I have done that walk-around and said that prayer for things that we, so far, have never done again.  Life does have a way of doing that.  Most “last times” happen without our ever having any clue.  Life can end up looking some completely new way before we even realize what happened.

Overall, I consider that a blessing.  I once would have thought that some of our changes and “lasts” would have broken my heart.  Some still might…  But that very same process also takes us to new places.  Often places we never imagined we’d go.  Sometimes to the very places from which we eventually look back and say, “Thank God I ended up here.” 

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to waste anything that life has for me: 

Opportunities to do new things, even if I didn’t realize I wanted them.  The chance to know and understand more about all kinds of people, even those with whom I might have once “thought” I had nothing in common.  The awareness of how much I can learn by living in the present moment and paying attention.  The chance to be honest about what that looks like, and maybe help someone else feel encouraged to do the same.    

At the end of our long weekend, I came home to my Real Life. 

My regular house (with no chef’s kitchen and zero guest bathrooms).  I thought about how much I appreciated where I had just been.  The wonderful time I’d just had.  The beautiful place I got to experience.  The people with whom I got to experience it.  How differently I had lived it all compared to the way I once might have. 

I tell you these things only to encourage you to notice and believe in what feels like your most authentic life.   

I wish you the kind of peace that comes with finding the balance of honoring where you have been, the place you find yourself now, and all that you have learned in between.  With deciding which things from the past you want to take into the future with you, and which ones you can become better for leaving behind. 

I want to trust that my here and now - and how I choose to spend it - just might be preparing me for the next thing God has in store for me.  Maybe you’ll join me? 

May we stay true to allowing what we know in our hearts to transform our minds – and our Real Lives.