Time is inevitable. It is unchanging and it will go on... even when you can't.
Time is a terrifying thing.
I didn't realize how things change, how people change, until I saw her. It struck me all at once, just at that moment when i saw her walking down the street.
There was a girl who lived down the street from me growing up. She was the same age as my oldest sister. To put it nicely, she wasn't the most responsible girl.
She got into trouble.
She didn't have the best track record.
She did things that people said were scandalous acts.
She wasn't perfect...
But no one's perfect.
The only difference, I realize now, is that when she made a mistake, everyone knew about it.
She couldn't have a flaw, couldn't learn her lesson from the mistakes she made, because- if she did make a mistake- someone at her school knew about it.
And if someone at her school knew about it, they told their siblings about it.
And if all the children of a family knew about it, then the parents of the family knew about it.
And, you see, that was how our whole neighborhood came to know when she made those mistakes.
People are hateful, judgmental creatures by nature. We criticize and pass judgment when it's not at all our place to do so...
But what can we say?
As sickeningly ironic as it is to say, we are not perfect.
Yet, somehow, we find the audacity to expect everyone else to be.
This girl, her name was Stephanie--same name as my sister.
She was pretty, if you took the chance to really look at her.
She would walk around the neighborhood so often that, if you left your house, there was a good chance you would see her at some point in the day.
She would walk with her two little dogs--some kind of terriers, though that doesn't really matter.
She would walk her two little dogs around and around our tiny mile stretch of a subdivision.
She walked so consistently that I found the reliability of seeing her there a simple comfort to me as a child. She would always be there, walking her two little dogs around our little mile stretch of a subdivion. In a world of uncertainties, that seemed certain.
As she walked, she would pass the ladies that lived around the neighborhood as they did their odd brisk-walks together incessantly. For some reason, their constant walking- unlike Stephanie's- wasn't as comfortingly reliable as it was just plain annoying. They bothered me, for some reason.
As they passed Stephanie, they would look over at her--see her, whisper something unpleasant about the girl to their walking partner, who would- in turn- whisper something equally unpleasant back.
They were all gossiping busy-bodies with nothing better to do: every one of them.
It's still a mystery to me how women who were as generically over-weight as they all were walked as ceaselessly as they did without seeming to have lost a single pound.
Stephanie had a little sister.
I don't know her name, but it's not really important.
She and her sister grew up together, and Stephanie's sister grew to be the spitting image of her older sibling. They quite realistically could have been twins born at different times.
Without my realizing it, the task of walking the two little dogs around the short mile stretch of our subdivision was passed from older sister to younger of the years.
As I grew older, it was still a comfort to me to see Stephanie there was always: walking her two little dogs around the short mile stretch of our subdivion.
Only, this girl wasn't Stephanie.
This was Stephanie's younger sister.
So I found myself, years later, driving home through the entrance of my little mile stretch of a subdivision. As I drove, I passed Stephanie walking down the street--the same comfort I hadn't yet realized I had so relied upon seeing as I grew older.
But today, Stephanie, wasn't in her usual little gym shorts and pink t-shirt, walking her two little terriers down the street of our short mile stretch of a subdivions.
She was dressed in a practical black sweater, comfy-looking black gaucho pants, and a cute little gray scarf.
And as she walked down the street, she pushed a stroller ahead of her carrying a tiny new-born baby girl--her baby girl.
But, seeing this odd spectacle in plain saight, there was nothing scandalous or disreputable about this sight.
She looked... like a mother.
She looked like she was right where she was supposed to be: wearing practical sweaters and walking a new-born baby.
I hadn't even realized that she had gotten old enough for having a baby to be acceptable...
But she had.
As she walked, she laughed and chatted aimlessly with her sister who strolled beside her.
She, on the other hand, was wearing little gym shorts and a pink t-shirt and walking two tiny dogs ahead of her.
I had to slow the car down to watch the sight before me.
Not having realized the presence of the sister, this was like looking at the effect of time right in front of my eyes.
There was Stephanie, as always, walking her dogs--the same old comforting sight from my childhood.
And there she was again, this time as an adult with a daughter of her own.
It was frightening and miraculous at the same time.
Suddenly, I looked down. I realized what I was doing--I was driving.
I wasn't watching this somewhat familiar sight from the back seat window of my mom's van.
I was old enough to drive myself, have my own car, and go to and from where I needed to be without the assistance of a parent.
Without realizing it, time had caught up with me.
-TG
