Ink Aria

Countdowns and Clock-Watching 

Renee Gehman

I always seem to be waiting for beginnings and ends. Things are never quite satisfactory in the middle, in the now, where I see things as they are, including their imperfections or what is missing. I see the potential perfection of beginnings and ends that lie ahead, which I imagine as holding a beauty like the world right after a snowfall, before anyone has set foot on anything.

When I’m not happy with the present, it becomes little more than a traffic jam I must endure until I reach my destination. But “Life is a journey, not a destination,” I’ve heard. Why is it so impossible to live knowing that sometimes? I mean really knowing that. That which has yet to happen often seems so much more important than that which is happening now. And so I am in Vietnam, having the hugest experience in my life thus far, and I’m appreciating it, but still, I can’t help but daydream about the reunions to come in the summer.

Then, I think, then everything will be okay. Except once I’m home everything will be okay once I have a job, and once I have a job everything will be okay once I have a husband, or children, or a master’s degree, and so on and so forth until the only thing I want to do before I die is make a return trip to my beloved Vietnam. —January 16, 2007

I like to read old journal entries to see how I have changed, but it is also humbling to see how I have not changed where perhaps I should have. I had to chuckle when I read that excerpt the other night, because here I am over two years later, pining for the summer again, this time as a high school teacher eager for a break. Once again, I am having a great life adventure (first-year teaching), and once again, I must admit to counting down the days to its end.

Last night I sat outside with my laptop to plan lessons, but a young guest at a party next door caught my eye. It was Alex, whom I’d had in my first class as a child care teacher after returning from Vietnam. Alex was in the neighbor’s backyard, throwing a giant Frisbee around by himself while everyone else ate on the deck. He didn’t bother himself with trying to catch the thing but rather launched it haphazardly into the air and then ran around (also haphazardly) and dove upon the ground, synchronizing his own fall with the Frisbee’s.

From afar I watched him: he was completely invested in his simple game, oblivious to the smells of grilled food and the sounds of happy conversation coming from just a few feet away. He was busy living in this moment.

Eventually I walked over to the fence and yelled his name. He looked up, his face glowing with that beautiful mischievous grin, and I said, with mock-accusation, “How come you never come over to my house to visit?!”

As I spoke he sprinted across the yard with his arms outstretched for a hug. “I’m FIVE!” he said excitedly as I lifted him into my arms, making the obligatory declaration about his increased size.

His mom came over too, told me the center had hosted the Family Night that week, on Tuesday, and that beforehand Alex had asked her if she thought I would be there. Last year I’d chased him around a lot, him and his buddies. I was living in the moment then too.

Now as I held Alex, he rotated his arms, displaying for me his various temporary tattoos, mostly featuring cars. His hair was still as blonde as could be, his cheeks still rosy.

Memories crept up on me. I remembered once—if I dare tell a story that reflects well on me amid others that don’t!—his mom had reported to me that he’d told her at home, “Mommy I just love Miss Renee. Not as much as I love you, but I really love her.” And I remembered the time we were lined up to go outside at school when he pointed at a “wet floor” sign by the bathroom and said, “I can read what that sign says.”

“Oh yeah? What does it say?”

“It says: You cannot come in this bathroom right now because Mr. George is cleaning it.”

I remembered how he used to get himself in trouble at nap time. He didn’t want to sleep, so instead of lying quietly and resting, which was the boring alternative, he would bounce up and down on his cot or kick his feet as fast as he could in the air, or throw his stuffed animal up in the air and catch it. Even when he wasn’t happy with his circumstances, Alex still lived in the moment. 

I appreciate now the way Alex continued to make the most of his time, finding ways to have fun even when it seemed like there was no fun to be had. I suppose he was too young for staring at the clock and counting down the minutes.

The hardest times are also the hardest times to live in the moment. And why shouldn’t they be? Why shouldn’t we look forward to better times when things get tough? It seems a healthy enough sequence of cause-and-effect to me. Still, Alex reminds me to discipline my countdowns and clock-watching so I too can live his in-the-moment joys.

—Renee Gehman, assistant editor, DreamSeeker Magazine, and high school teacher, is counting down the days until she is better at living in the moment on a daily basis.