I just turned my calendar over to June. That’s five months of the year gone already. Time is flying by too fast, as it always seems to, but this year I’m more ambivalent about the passing of time than usual. One reason is that I was told by my doctor that it typically takes 3 months to recover from whooping cough, so at times I have been wanting those 3 months to pass by quickly so that I can feel healthy again. I’m almost at the 3-month mark now and I am feeling the difference, so I am thankful for the passage of my unhealthy time, though I mourn the loss of so much productive time. Also, my Giveaway project is a commitment that requires action each and every day of this year, so, like the illness, it changes the way I look at the year. At this point in the calendar, although I can tell myself I’ve completed over 150 days of this project, I still have over 200 days to go, which can seem daunting some days. And on those days, I sometimes find myself wishing I could fast forward to the last month of the project so I can be closer to achieving my goal more quickly. But, that would be a big chunk of life – a whole six months full of interesting, painful, beautiful, challenging, heart-warming, heart-breaking moments – gone, just like that. So, no, I really don’t want the year to go by any faster than it already is.

Today was a day that seemed a little slower and a little fuller than most – mostly because I allowed myself to relax and also to be spontaneous. I lingered and savored my afternoon at a wonderful jazz performance at the Japanese garden where I am helping. I perhaps relaxed too much and neglected my family and my Giveaway a bit. But then when I got home, I chose to invite our friends, Patty and John and their son Harry (who is friends with our son Theo) over for dinner fairly spontaneously. We’d all had a busy day, but somehow it worked. Theo and I rushed to the grocery store, David tidied up and set the table, Patty and John brought wine, and while the big boys chatted and the little boys played, Patty and I prepped the food and chatted. I decided not to worry that I hadn’t made my Giveaway and focus on enjoying conversation with Patty, who is a terrific conversationalist – wise, worldly and witty too – as well as being a creative professional and another mother of an only boy. As we finished prepping the food and got ready to take it outside onto the patio, she asked me if I could lend her a sweater. Again, spontaneity was our friend. I had a purple, paisley-design shawl I knew I wanted to give away. I offered it too her and she loved it. My Giveaway was done painlessly and we were able to get back to dinner and spend some quality time together. And that’s the key. One of the few things in our lives that is inevitable is that time will pass, but, as I am realizing 150 or so days into this year and this Giveaway, we mustn’t let it pass us by.