There is a time for everything,
    and a season for every activity under the heavens.

(Ecclesiastes 3:1)

Just about everyone who has ever worked a job outside of home knows about “life status changes.”  That’s the benefits category label for when you have…well, a life status change like a marriage or a birth or adoption or some other significant status change.  

We had one of those yesterday.  Our youngest child was married, and to a wonderful man.  I was blessed to escort her down the aisle and, with her mother, “give her away” (I smile at that because she’s been her own person standing on her own feet for a long time).  I was honored to pray over them and to dance with her.  For a few days this past week, all of our three children were in the same place at the same time, celebrating with family and friends and I was blessed to sit back and enjoy it all.  

The days of June LaDeece (the name of our eldest daughter’s doll) and “I’m going up the street to Tony Lorraine’s” (a near constant summertime refrain from our son as he ran out the door) and the My Little Pony books (one of our youngest’s first book collection) are long gone…except, in my memory.  There’s no more waking them up for school and Sunday School, brushing and braiding hair, picking out clothes for them to wear or making sure they ate breakfast before they left the house.  There are no more trips to pediatricians or to visit grandparents, the ones who lived close by and those who were at a distance.  There are no more parent-teacher conferences, report cards to review, band concerts, sporting events or recitals to attend.  There are no more prom dresses or tuxes to buy or rent, no more curfews to impose, no more driving lessons to teach.  There are no more tuition payments to make or advice to give (unless it is asked for).  Those seasons have passed, but they are alive in my memory.

The joy of yesterday is already tucked away in my memory, and like the rest, I will relive it from time to time.  It was a wonderful day.  

© Byron L. Hannon, 2021.  All rights reserved to text content unless otherwise noted.