Keeping Up

When people ask me about my kids, I tend to reel off the many things that they are doing and add that "I am just trying to keep up."
 
It's true--there are a lot of things going on, and sometimes, it does feel like a constant race, in which I am not entirely sure which direction to run at any given time. If it is a relay race, and I "pass the baton" to the wrong person, the race changes completely.
 
What is interesting, however, is that, while I may not literally "keep up" with every detail of what they are doing, just the fact that they DO at all, and that I am simultaneously DOING work to sustain their various DOING, means that, in some small way, I am keeping up.
 
When you run a race, do you remember every detail the next day, or weeks later? Perhaps if it is a short race, or if you are a professional runner. Most runners (of whom I am definitely not one), I suspect, remember the high points--the difficulties, the small leaps, the finish line. And that is kind of how it is with life. If, in keeping up, I see the performances and games, and share and remember small victories and defeats along the way, perhaps that really is "keeping up."
 
And perhaps, sometimes, just keeping up is quite enough.