Fleeting Moments I: The Cul de Sac

This Shabbos afternoon, I was awakened from the deep sleep of my nap by the familiar sound of children playing. I recognized the noise as coming from the cul de sac around the corner; less than 100 feet away as the crow flies.

What was different about these sounds is that they were not coming from our children or their friends. The sounds were from the scores of kids that seem to have sprung up in the neighborhood while we weren't looking.

When did this happen? It seems like just the other day that we were woken up by our own kids on Shabbos afternoons when the weather was not quite hot enough for our air conditioners to be turned on. Now our kids are far too old to be hanging out in the cul de sac. That's for little kids.

MHW and I talked about this on Shabbos afternoon. We were taking care of the Baby. She is finally crawling and is also starting to cruise. Our grandson, a real chevrahman, started walking a while ago. Mr. Perpetual Motion. It occured to us that we don't remember what our kids looked like when they started crawling or walking. We pretty much don't remember anything. We just have a lot of pictures.

Before you know it, the parents of the current generation of cul de sac kids will be asking the same question. Where did the time go?