Days as a young parent are busy and noisy to say the least.
As a stay at home mom, I find myself both attuned to the constant commotion of kids in the background, while simultaneously feeling like my head is constantly below water.
I am drowning in the noise.
The sound of bare feet running across the kitchen floor and tennis shoes skipping on the sidewalk. The sound of singing in the bathroom while going potty and midnight whispers when they’re tucked in bed supposedly asleep. Fighting over seats at the table, screaming when someone gets their hair pulled, or tears when the toddler breaks out her final defense and bites the older ones when they won’t give her back her toy.
The noise is everywhere.
It is my constant companion.
Whether it’s two o’clock in the morning and the baby is crying out needing another dose of milk, or it’s noon and even though lunch is less than five minutes away from being the table, everyone is hungry (or hangry, rather) and loudly expressing the feelings of their little tummies.
Even during meal time, if by some amazing gift everyone is happily consuming the food dished out on their plates rather than complaining they don’t like dinner (despite the fact that they loved that same meal last time you made it), the silence of full mouths rarely exists. The toddler is vocally enjoying what she’s eating and the older one has picked up a rhythm by hitting her heal against the leg of her chair, and is chewing to the beat of her newly discovered song.
And the noise goes on and on and on.
Despite the noise, or perhaps because of the constant noise, I find myself truly at peace whenever those joyful moments of quiet find their way to my world.
They are pitifully rare and extremely inconsistent in their timing. But they come. And, oh, how I cherish them when they do!
I know every grandparent I’ve every talked to reminds me to enjoy the noise.
“Some day you’ll sit in silence, just you and your spouse, and you’ll wish you could hear the sound of little feet on the kitchen floor and your children fighting in the background.” they say.
And I am sure they are right.
At their stage in life, the noise of children laughing and playing and even fighting is as treasured to them as the sound of quiet is to me at my current stage in life.
I think that is the beauty of life, the beauty of age – we experience so many different moments and then those moments pass.
Children grow up, we grow wrinkles and grey hair, and eventually we get to see our children and those younger than us follow those same stages of life that we experience.
Children grow up, we grow wrinkles and grey hair, and eventually we get to see our children … follow those same stages of life that we experience.
But because I’m not there yet – because I haven’t reached that point of having only my spouse’s infrequent noises to keep me company all day long, and instead continue to dwell in the realm of childhood excitement and banter – I think I’ll take the quiet when I can.
You and I both know it will be short lived in the short term, and when considering the day-to-day, the short term counts too.
So I’ll take my moments when and while I can, and find happiness in the quiet moments of life.[]
