Amanda Lamb: Where's the rewind button?

Ever wish you could rewind, and just go back a day, or a week? I think a lot of us are feeling this right now, wishing we could rewind the clock to a time not that long ago when every waking moment wasn’t consumed with the coronavirus.

For our kids, this is especially true. The college students want to be back on campus, hanging out with their friends, living an independent life—not the one they are living now, in their parents’ homes, going to school online.

The high school students are also missing their friends, their activities, sports, prom, graduation. They feel like so many things have been taken away from them in the blink of an eye. And its true. That’s exactly what has happened.

I remember when my mother was dying, she said she wished she could rewind to the night before she found out she was sick. She said as she lay in her bed, the bathroom light peeking through a crack in the door, she didn’t stop to appreciate what she had in that moment—a comfortable bed in a comfortable home, the use of her arms and legs, nothing major to worry about except work the next day.

It started me thinking about what I would appreciate more if I could rewind a week or two from this moment. Dinner out a restaurant with my husband, kids coming and going from my house, a full calendar, book club, coffee with my running group, going to the movie theater, traveling, stability, comfort, good health.

But we can’t rewind—not us, not our kids. What we can do is appreciate what we do have now, and when some normalcy does return, and it will, we can appreciate that too, even the mundane stuff. Oh, how I long for the mundane. Don’t you?