Ground Hog's Day

Time, for me, is not measured from New Year's to New Year's. For the last few years time, for me, has been measured from Ground Hog's Day to Ground Hog's Day. Time between November and February speeds by at a dizzying rate but slows down right at the beginning of Feb. I find myself year after year riding home from school with my youngest daughter having a conversation about Punxsutawney Phil and whether or not we are going to have six more weeks of winter. All the while, while holding up my end of the conversation I am thinking to myself "has it already been an entire year since we had this conversation? It feels just last week that we were discussing this very same thing." I look at my daughter, as I have for the last five years in amazement and notice again the changes the last year has brought. When we moved here she was only five years old. Just a baby on her way to kindergarten. She was learning to write her name and how to count pennies. Now she is tall and graceful and quickly growing into a young woman. (That scares me.) The same is true of my other two children. My oldest daughter was just ten years old when we moved here. A few days ago she turned sixteen. Now days our conversations revolve around boys, cars and college. Occasionally my son will chip in a comment or two in his man's voice and leave me wondering where went the days of toy cars and trucks.
I always told myself that the first Christmas the kids were gone from home I would take off in an RV and go somewhere. No tree, no presents, just enjoy the season. Yesterday I got to thinking a little more deeply about that and realized that the first Christmas they aren't all here to come tripping down the stairs to see what Santa brought is going to be tough. I cannot imagine what it will be like to not have all of them here. I cannot force myself to think about what it will be like the first Christmas that none of them are here.
One thing I like about GH's day is that there is no pressure. I don't think about it until it gets here. It just arrives one day on your doorstep without any preamble and another year has passed. The kids leaving one by one and not being here for Christmas is a devastating thought for me but the kids not being here for GH's day doesn't really affect me at all. Well at least until my youngest leaves home. Not having that yearly conversation with her will certainly be missed, at least the first time. But thinking positively, I still have eight more GH's days to go before that happens. That would make me...how old?... Oh, Lordie, I'm gonna be?...(gasp)...Uhh...
let's not go there after all.