The Best Years

Every time I go to the store with some or all of my children, old people will come up to me and comment on my family. They always have this wistful nostalgic look on their faces while they tell me to enjoy these years. That these were the best years of their life.

It used to sort of depress me, because, really? Is this as good as it is ever going to get? Am I really going to wax nostalgic over night after night of interrupted sleep, dirty diapers, endless laundry and tantrums? But then I began thinking that perhaps these old people were just going senile and that was oddly comforting.


Last week, nabbalicious wrote a hilarious story about something she did as a child. At the end of the post she wrote that she asked her mother about it and her mother told her that she didn't remember the incident, that she had in fact blocked most of the things she and her brother did out.

I thought it was just me. No wonder that past 11 years seem to have flown by. I hardly remember any of it.

Yesterday my kids started playing the "Remember when" game, otherwise known as the game to make Mom feel as though she has early onset Alzheimer's.

Some of the things I remember well, like when my then 3 and 5 yr old decided to "help" open the box that our pool came in, by sitting on top of the box and repeatedly stabbing it with steak knives they had pilfered from the dishwasher. The pool was damaged, though we didn't notice the damage until after we filled it and 2000 gallons of water leaked out all over our backyard. In fact it was the subject of my first blog entry ever.

Some I sort of remember, like when we first bought our house and one of the kids, Not Me, pulled the downspout (which was attached to the gutter three full stories above) off of the house and everyone rode over it with their bicycles until it was a flattened piece of aluminum laying sadly across the lawn. I have completely blocked out my reaction and Rob's reaction, though judging from the way the kids were laughing and holding their stomachs while retelling this story, whatever our reaction it didn't have the effect we desired.

Some are gone forever, like my 5yr old falling down and putting his teeth through his lip. I don't remember this at all. But apparently it was fairly recent and my kids tell me that I let him stay up late, sit on the couch with me, and eat popsicles until he felt better. I said, "Wow I am such a nice mommy, huh?" To which one of them responded, "No, it wasn't fair that he got to have all those popsicles and stay up late." Can't please everyone.

And they continued on. Some of the stories made me laugh, like when one of my kids went through a stage where he would like to pretend he would fall down the stairs, very theatrically and scream, "whoa, whoa, whoa" the entire way down. And how one time Rob thought he really was falling and shoved another child aside to "save" this one.

Some I am glad to have almost forgotten. Like the time everyone in the family had a stomach bug and my oldest son leaned over his top bunk to throw up and did so all over his brother sleeping below him. And how we had to wake him up and tell him he was covered in vomit not his own, and uh he might not want to open his mouth and talk just yet. Sometimes I feel like I live in a frat house. Also, we have never ever regained an interest in eating pizza pockets. In fact, if you want to get back at someone for wronging you, you only have to utter the phrase, "I am thinking of... PIZZA POCKETS"

Most of the stories I wish I could remember with more clarity. Some made me cringe with embarrassment over my own childish reactions. You'll have to trust me on this one. Not pretty.

Overall, I found myself feeling relieved since their stories were being recounted with laughter, even things that were not funny at the time had taken on a new humorous twist.

That must be the reason the old people say that it was the best years of their lives, they barely remember any of it. And the things that they do have been spit shined by time.

When I grow up, I want to be one of those old people in the grocery store. I want to remember these as the best years of my life.

I really, really do.