Thank You, Universe

Being a parent to 3-month-old twins is hard.

I get lost in the minutae of the moment...how much sleep they've gotten today, how the hell we're going to transfer from 5 naps per day to 3 without ever staying awake longer than 2 hours (math = more fun with sleep deprivation!), and how to institute that perfect bedtime routine.

But thankfully the universe delivers periodic reminders of the big picture.

Yesterday, Mr Awesome and I loaded the boys into the Baby Bjorns and set off to Golden Gate Park. We took a beautiful walk around Stow Lake. He goes back to work tomorrow, after a wonderful vacation together, and our conversation was drifting from our fun holiday memories to the logistics of returning to our daily routine. There is simply too much to do in a day, and inevitably our needs are not going to get totally met. My back was starting to ache with the weight of it all. And the weight of little Squeak. He's getting so heavy!

Suddenly we hear a shout, "Are they twins?" A family was drifting alongside us in a paddle boat. Two tousle-headed boys pedaled in tandem, the parents reclining peacefully in the back. Grins adorned each face.

"Yes," we called back. "Three months." We must have looked it too, with our tired eyes and spit-up stains and my awful too-big-but-still-the-only-fitting maternity jeans.

The parents' voices were full of sincerity. "It gets so much easier. It a few years, they will be carrying you!" They gestured to their 11-year-olds, cheerfully ferrying their parents around the lake. "Two is much better than one. They're best friends and we have so much fun. It really does get easier."

I absolutely believe them.

Keep sending me reminders, universe, that one day all the tiny things I worry about will be a distant memory, that change is inevitable, that the days are long but the years are short.

That the thing to do with abundance is to embrace it.