The Window Seat and the Weight of Time

There is something about looking out a window while traveling that makes you honest.

The sky does not care about your deadlines.

The clouds do not know you missed Sunday’s post.

The road stretches anyway.

I have been traveling these past few days. I am in Iowa for my dad’s prostate cancer surgery.

As a child, I did not think about fragility. Not consciously. Even though I lived inside it.

There were moments when my life could have split in half. Moments when I powered through because that is what children do. They survive first and make meaning later.

Back then, danger felt normal. I did not call it fragile. I called it Tuesday.

Now I am at an age where fragility has names and faces. Friends losing parents. Parents losing friends. Diagnoses that no longer feel rare. Obituaries that land too close to home.

And I find myself staring out this window thinking:

How did I not see it before?

The truth is, I did.

I just did not have the language.

I used to think surviving was the goal.

Now I think noticing is.

Life has always been fragile.

I am just finally letting myself see it.