Life is only a second long. You're thinking "No its not, dummy, can't you math at all?" Yes I know, on average humans living in the United States have an overall life expectancy of about 80 years. Which means we all have about 2524554080 seconds, give or take a few thousands depending on how long you live.
However, metaphorically speaking, life is only a blink of an eye. And if you're God and live outside of time the life of one human is like probably indescribably short in the grand scheme of things.
We're here and then we're gone. One of the entries I made described a short scene from my 9th birthday. It actually takes longer to describe my 9th birthday than the memory can last in my mind. I remember many details but that day was gone as soon as it was there. Its a blur, a short lived moment in my life. Every point in history is just a blip on time. Just a tiny dot. Many days in my past are blips on my time line. Yesterday, because it is closer to me seems bigger, but last week is a blur, seems distant, seems minuscule. The whole week seems to blur together as one solitary moment. The memory of my first born son's birth and the entire event, even the process of delivery and every moment up until my labor started is just a blink. I can visualize that day and remember it but its just a blink. It lasted a "long time" on that very day but now looking back it didn't seem to last long at all.
When I was a kid I couldn't wait to grow up. I have a memory that if I blink its gone. It takes less time to visualize it than it does to type this entry. That's how short that day lasted. Yes it was 24 hours long but it was also just a blip. Its weird to explain. I have this memory of me laying on my bed at 10 years old and looking up at the ceiling light. I was holding a stuffed yellow elephant I had gotten from a garage sale. I looked sadly over at the door in my bedroom and then back at the ceiling light. I closed my eyes so I could see the colors from staring at a light too long and a tear rolled down my cheek. I was scared. For some reason in that short moment, that blip in time, I was able to recognize life for what it is....gone in a minute. I saw a future flash before my eyes but that flash that's exactly how life feels. That flash is how quickly I got from being 10 years old and sobbing on my bed to being 27 with 4 kids. I saw, and visualized in my head my growth, adulthood, aging and dying. And I cried because I didn't want to grow up. So I called to my mother, tears soaking my cheeks and I sobbed out loud "I don't want to grow up"
But a few days later I wanted ice cream and Mom said I had to wait so I thought "Dang it I can't wait to be grown so I can eat ice cream whenever I want"
Now that I'm grown, that thought seems so silly to me. I don't want to eat ice cream at any random time. I don't even always have the money to get ice cream . I have to pay so many bills and for kids things that ice cream isn't even on my mind that often.
Now that I am a grown up, an adult, I think to myself "I would like it if I had just one more day to live out my childhood so I could play with my brothers, be a good big sister, behave better for my parents, enjoy my toys and my family"
I think I would have liked to be a kid for one more moment. If I could get 24 hours of childhood back for just 24 hours I sometimes think I would just because I truly did not cherish what it meant to be a child. I thought being an adult was no rules, eat what you want, sleep when you want.
And its not. You wake up at 5-6 a.m and you go to sleep because you're tired and have no choice, exhaustion consumes you, and you're tucked in your bed by 10-10:30 the latest.
I really know that I do not want to be a kid again not even for a short time. Not because childhood was a total lame section of my life. But because I have my own kids to watch over and care for and love on and watch them grow. And that to me is more important than revisiting some moment in my past.
I digress, the point of this entry is.....that every day is gone before you know it. Every minute is as tiny as a grain of sand and at the end of your life you'll probably look back and say "Where did it all go?" Even if you spent every moment doing something of importance, even if you never intentionally let a second slip away you'll still wake up one day and have a memory of a specific event in your life and you'll think of it and go "That day didn't last long enough"
Thinking back on different days in my past I say "I didn't cherish that moment enough"
or "I wish I would have taken it all in so I would never forget even one second" But you do, and you can't control it. And in the grand scheme of things, how much time you get isn't important its how you spend it.
Now that I'm Catholic I know its important to spend each day in conversation with God. Its important to grasp every spare moment for prayer. Its important to store up my treasures for Heaven. Its not as important to try to grab every second like a miser grabs every penny as if its going to all run out. Because it will all run out. Your last grain of sand will fall as you take your last breath and how fast it all went won't matter. How you spent it will.
Thank God for every "Grain of sand" he gives you. Some people don't even get more than one before they draw their last breath.
But remember....its gone before you know it. So use each "grain" wisely.
Your life is precious. But it only lasts a second....
You may comment now "Rhea you're a bummer"
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