Yesterday after dinner, I sat at the kitchen island and caught a glimpse of the clock display on the oven. It read 5:35pm. Normally, I would calculate the time until lights out for bed and choose how to fill those couple of hours. But in that moment, I realized that over the last week, my relationship with time has changed dramatically.
Whereas units of time generally include hours or minutes, for us right now it’s more accurate to say they are now length of feedings and time between feedings. My wife and I have had to experiment with how long our shifts with the baby should be so that the other person can get adequate sleep.
It may be the first time ever that I have had multiple alert experiences with the wee hours of the night over a week period. To me, midnight used to be a time that slipped by as I slept. It was like a flyover hour. I know we pass it to get from evening to morning, but it’s not a place I particularly wanted to visit. But now, as I sit holding my daughter and these late night and early morning hours pass, I can say that it’s been a good contemplative period. The house is calm and quiet, the small lamp beside me emits a warm light and is the only illumination in the room. There are no droning noises from lawn mowers cutting grass or leaf blowers pushing debris. The stillness is welcomed, but I still haven’t yet figured out what I am supposed to do with it. Is this the time to write? Is it a time to think deeply and meditate? I keep asking these questions, but the answers aren’t clear to me yet. We’re still figuring this new schedule out, so I guess ultimately time will tell.
So long for now.
Felix