The years start coming and they simply do not stop coming

Smash Mouth said it best— the years start coming and they don’t stop coming.

It’s a cyclical human experience that we never quite adjust to, marvelling each year at time’s too-quick passage.

July 2 is the year’s 183rd day and some quick math will tell you that means there are only 182 days left in the year, making this Sunday the halfway point of 2023.

If it hasn’t started already, your Halloween and fall-obsessed friends will soon begin their countdown to spooky season. My fiance will tell you that I insist on putting up fall decorations at the beginning of September even though the autumn solstace isn’t until the end of the month.

Perhaps your Christmas-crazy friends have started their countdown as well. My mother is known as the Christmas Queen in our family and she begins her countdown on December 26 each year, so although it may sound way too early, I can assure you that it happens.

All children wish for time to move faster. For some reason, the days of childhood pass so slowly that time can seem to stand still. It felt like summer break would never happen. Halloween took forever to arrive. The Christmas season felt so long that I thought Santa had to be magically stalling because the elves were behind on their gift quota. The adults in our lives tried to warn us to slow down because we were going to miss those leisurely days when they were behind us, but we never listened.

Now, as an adult, I see that my parents, teachers, and family members were telling the truth. Time is truly unrelenting.

I find myself begging for the time to slow down for so many reasons. I need more time to work, clean, and run errands, but also to pursue the passions and hobbies that make life worth living. My nieces and nephews are growing up so fast that if I blink, I miss something. Coordinating time to spend time with my friends is impossible. It doesn’t even feel like I get a full 30-31 days between rent payments.

There’s a reason that we all joke about how we still haven’t had the chance to process 2020, so it’s insane that it’s about to be 2024. This too, I suppose, is another cyclical human experience that we share with our earliest ancestors. No matter what personal or world events may occur, the years start coming and they simply do not stop coming.

Imagine being in medieval Europe when the bubonic plague ravaged its population. After 3 years of massive and continous sickness and death, the plague slowed and ended and society had to continue. There was emotional recovery and repopulating and rebuilding to be done, after all.

We don’t get to control time, because unfortunately, life isn’t an Adam Sandler movie. We have to try to make the best (notice I did not say most) of the time we are given and try to appreciate moments while we’re in them, no matter how bored or unsatisfied or ready for the next chapter we may feel at the time. As we learned from our frivolity with time in our youths, one day we will look back and wish we could revisit a period of time we had once carelessly wished away.

As we approach the year’s halfway point, remember to take a step back during all of life’s madness, look past the chaos, and think about what you’re going to miss about these days. Think about the things you could miss out on if you’re always trying desperately to keep up with time’s unrelenting pace. And then, be grateful that you get to enjoy and savor those things now.