The Lunchtime of our Lives
We are talking about old age this morning.
Actually, my husband is talking to me. I am staring at my computer instead of making eye contact because I don’t want to talk, but he is not taking the hint. He keeps talking, and so I relent.
Have you ever gotten on a subject as a couple and it seems like every conversation winds its way back to that one?
Lately we’ve been discussing how in the hell we got so old.
It might be brought on by our recent foray into the world of girls’ basketball. Kids whom I saw fresh from their mama’s womb are getting called for a double dribble, tackling other girls, driving for the basket, throwing in layups.
Watching these girls do things that I’m not coordinated enough to do feels strange because I realize that they are all quite old, which means that I am quite old.
Whoever said that raising young kids is like taking a 10-year-nap has it exactly right. Now that they aren’t so reliant on me for everyday needs, I feel as though I’m coming to, blinking twice, wiping the sleep from my eyes and seeing that the rest of the world went on while I was asleep.
And as I stretch and lie there, trying to get my bearings, I stop and ask myself what it is, again, that I am all about. What do I do and what do I enjoy? I can’t, for a time, remember, and that strikes a little fear into my heart. I decide to share this with my husband.
“We’re not so very young anymore,” I tell him. “Some would say, even, that we are entering the afternoon of life.”
“Nu-uh,” he says. “I’m just starting lunch. I’m just sitting down to lunch, in fact. The check I wrote last week, that was coming into the lunchroom. That was me paying the lunchlady.”
As two entrepreneurs, we have been both building our separate businesses while the kids were wee. Finally, last week, we wrote the last check to the last credit card which, I’m embarrassed to say, periodically sustained us through these years of a billion and one half diapers, an appendectomy, a broken ankle, infant and toddler clothes, vast quantities of chicken nuggets — and without which we would have been sleeping in snow banks and thumbing rides to elementary school.
This last check made us debt free, except for our mortgage. It was a long time in coming. I promised my kids that I would dance in the light of the moon in our front yard when it actually happened – mostly because I wasn’t sure it ever would – but we have been working so hard and now it is here and I’m sure they are going to hold me to that dancing thing, but that’s a post for another day.
“So we’re in the lunchroom now. Feasting.” I clarify.
He nods and tells me I can have whatever I want.
I like this way of looking at how life pans out (probably because I believe so ardently in delayed gratification).
Those early hours of a school day are all about the academics. Seated straight-backed at our desks, no art projects or gym class or music or specials. Just work. No talking to your neighbor, no tasting the paste. Just sharp pencils and worksheets and you churning away, blind to everything else.
Having these babies and struggling with bills and working for almost nothing for what seems like ages. But then comes lunch. And you can pick and choose what you want.
“We feast until we’re 45 or so, at which point,” he pats his belly and arches his back and says “We loosen our belts and let it all hang out for 20 years or so. And then, after we have eaten lunch, then – and only then – are we in the afternoon of life.”
And you know what comes after lunch, don’t you? Recess!
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