Frozen in Time

I need to address a strange, yet common, phenomenon. This particular experience remains unnamed despite being such a prevalent occurrence. I'll call it "time dysplasia." It happens when you meet a child again after not having seen them for a period of time. They stay frozen in your mind just as they were, no matter how long you've been absent. When you do see them again it's a struggle to make your brain accept that this is, in fact, the same child.

It's a self-centered view of the world or a preservation technique, because if we consider how time passing was affecting everyone we knew it would be beyond overwhelming. The mental fuses we blow, seeing that tiny baby we knew graduating from high school, are relatively minor compared to the nervous breakdowns that would ensue from constantly being aware of our own mortality, not to mention our loved ones'. Between birth and three years the leaps and bounds accomplished in short time spans makes seeing kids that age particularly disorienting.

Example-- Riley at birth:
Photo Credit: Lara Coughlin

A few weeks later:

Photo Credit: Rebecca Brittain

A few more:


A mere 12mo after she was born:


Three months after her birthday:
Photo Credit: Lara Coughlin

So, if you saw her when she was born, and then again at Easter, it would be hard to reconcile the squirmy pink little newborn with the sitting up, babbling baby with bunny ears, and if the next time you saw her was Christmas, it would seem magical that she had transformed into a walking, talking toddler.

When you're with a child everyday you watch them grow a little, learn a little, and change every day. You witness each milestone individually.  As an outside observer, though, each visit is an onslaught of accomplishments and changes. This inundation leaves you sputtering sentence fragments and shaking your head as if to force acceptance of the present and your frozen memory together. It's like bumping into an ex and his new girlfriend months after a break up.

Beyond causing the kind of shock that mires down brain function it is conspicuous evidence of time's relentless march. I often run into kids I used to babysit and think, "No, you can't be graduating college!  I just graduated college, didn't I?  Holy cow, it's been how many years? No, that makes me... Old."  I babysat these kids as toddlers and now they have college degrees and I have a toddler. There's so much that didn't go the way I thought it would back then. There's so much I haven't done.

My sister's birthday has begun to cause the same kind of introspection.  "You're 25?!? No, no I'm 25. You're 23."  That was over 3yrs ago.  I begin to empathize with inhabitants of the Twilight Zone who wake up on other planets or in empty white rooms with no doors.  I don't know how I got here.  The last time that I was acutely aware of my age was at 25.  What have I been doing that could possibly have caused so many years to pass?

The kids' birthdays are even worse. Isaac will be 9 this year. How am I old enough to be parenting a 9yr old child? Ok, so the year he was born, I was a sophomore in college, and when he was one, I was studying abroad in Ireland, convinced I'd never have children, and in love with someone who wasn't his father, although that kind of makes it all the more difficult to absorb. I have no excuse for Riley's age shocking me. I have been here for every moment of her life. I look back at my maternity photos, and in the same moment it seems a million years ago and yesterday.

Where does it go?