A Different Someday

I remember a time in my life where all I wished for was for everyone to be old enough to feed themselves and buckle their own seat belts. At that season of my life, those thoughts felt like a 'someday' that would never come. I could hardly imagine a life where I wasn't dressing little people and making bottles.

Now that 'someday' is here, ever present. My little people are now big people who can buckle their own seat belts while simultaneously fighting over reserved seats in the car. I no longer dress them, I simply stare at all the clothing they leave on every surface of the floor. Instead of spending my time making bottles, I drive in endless circles shuttling everyone here, there and everywhere.

Back then, in my season of little ones, I thought that this 'someday' would somehow be different. A good different. A life-will-be-so-much-better different. And guess what? It's just different. Not better, not worse, just different. One exhausting chore has simply been traded for another. Little people tantrums simply grow into teenage melt downs. Not better. Just different.

I think we tend to view the future with relief. We wish away the hard parts of today with a firm belief that next month, next year, next season will be better. We convince ourselves that because it will be different than today, it will therefore be so-much-better. But change has never equated to better. And next month, next year has never promised a new 'someday'. That has to come from a place within and not a season of life.

I see things differently now than I did back then. Experience, age, mothering, enduring. It all tends to change my viewpoint. But most of all, it changes me. Not the season, not the year, not even my everyday tasks. They have changed me. That's the perfect kind of different. The one with purpose and promise. 'Someday' is today, I just have to have the patience not to wish it away.