Day 11: the Space Between

Day 11

(one) At a bar watching the summer Olympics with two friends. There is a list of things we plan to do that weekend: hikes, farmers' markets, waterfalls, food trucks, comedy show. It's our annual vacation but we are not ready quite yet. Our fourth friend is arriving at the airport. For now, we sit in a pub, listen to live music, and watch the Olympics.

(two) Trudging downhill in the hot, hot sun with two people I met that weekend. I'm tired, I'm out of shape, I'm dirty. Also, my water bottle is nearly empty. A teammate pauses to listen to the birds. He motions up to the sky, invites me to listen, and smiles broadly. I listen.

(three) Wet, cold, sore. I'm flat on my back on a snowy mountain. Again. I need to sit up and stand up. This is not as simple as it sounds. My feet are strapped to a snowboard and I've been doing this all day. I'm tired. My friend tells me to look across the mountain at the view. The sky is clear. The lake is flat. The air is crisp.

These memories are of between moments. The pause before a vacation, the pause between steps in a relay race, the pause between attempts at snowboarding.  I focus so well on completing tasks that I often miss the present. These memories are vivid because my tasks were interrupted, by circumstances or by people stepping in and telling me to pause. Society bombards us with the message to move quickly onto bigger and better things. Life is not worthwhile unless we are deriving the maximum enjoyment from each second and each action. This is untrue. The next time you're unhappy, overwhelmed, or frantically thinking about the next item on your to-do list, pause. For a second. For a moment.

Enjoy the space between breaths, the pauses between steps, the moments between the beginning and the end.

What is your favorite between moment?