When I arrived at the airport and my ex and kids picked me up a couple of weeks ago, I got first-hand experience of what PokemonGo was like. It was requested that I make one stop at the airport and probably two or three other stops, including one at the Southwest Children’s Museum in Midland. I was immediately struck that for some of these PokemonGo pickups my children had to exit the car and move around, and frankly I was happy that they were motivated to do that on their own.
I’m not always as happy to do stops like that. Sometimes I’m in a hurry, and other times I’m in my own world. But coming back home made me happy. I’d missed everyone, and my kids seemed to have aged a little in maturity. They were interacting SLIGHTLY more like adults, and somehow this transformation had occurred with my being gone.
It really struck me as strange that they would not just physically grow up, but emotionally grow up while I was gone. It made me want to miss as little of the growing up as possible. Now, when I am talking to either child, I’m a little slower to savor the interaction. My eye contact lingers on them. I’m paying more attention to their expressions. I don’t know if they notice me noticing them or not, but I am. I’m noticing them growing up, and it’s happening frightfully fast.
But while it’s happening, I’ll take the smiles, the mischievous looks, the sarcastic eye twinkles, and whatever else they have, because tomorrow they’ll be older—a lot older. And I’ll be less cool soon. I’m already a little uncool, I think. Still SOMEWHAT cool, but I know it will fade fast.