We are often told to "enjoy it while you can," whether that "it" means the cookie you were dying for, your first relationship, or in most cases, your family.
Being a kid or a teen, we often just brush off that statement thinking we'll be forever young. It doesn't hit everyone at the same time, but at one point, you will realize that you wish you listened when you were told to "enjoy it while you can" because now here you are, up at 3 am stressing over a paper that you know is due in 3 hours that you should have started a week ago when it was assigned. Or maybe you were sitting with your very best friends laughing at what seemed to be the funniest thing you ever heard in the world, when you stop and look at your very favorite people and realize that in a matter of months, you'll be in different schools on opposite sides of the country. Hey, it may even be when you come home from work to find a letter from your school telling you when your senior pictures are being taken. Or maybe it's when you see your big sister all dressed up for her senior prom, you remember when she was that awkward, tall, shy kid but is now the person you look up to and looks beautiful. But most painfully, maybe it's when you're sitting with your family, a home filled with the people who have watched you become who you are today. You look around the room and can't help but have that sinking feeling in your chest when you see empty chairs that were once filled with the one guy who never let you down or the one chair that has just become empty.
Time will move on whether we want it to or not--that's for sure. There are very few things that we, as humans, can be completely sure of but time is one of them. We can't tell time to stop when we decide to realize how much we missed. It doesn't work like that, although that sounds very nice, it just doesn't and will never stop for us when we decide we need to go back and cherish the things we thought we'd never lose. In all honesty, it is human nature to get lost in our lives, and worrying about time gets pushed to the back. However, it doesn't give us the right to take things for granted even though, sadly, it happens more then we like to admit.
There is nothing to do now as we can't change the past or go back and spend more time with someone or beg time to give us a little more time in this moment.
We are often told to "enjoy it while you can," and quite frankly, do enjoy whatever it may be before it's gone.