I imagined the house quiet, after they’d left. I could hear the memory of their voices as they were now, an echo. I could feel my heart pull in the way a hand contracts to a fist, the way a tide recedes as it pulls out, the sound as everything settles down and softens. And all there was was loss for all I didn’t do now. So I called out goodnight and they called back, and when I woke the next morning I rose the same as I did any other day, not knowing any more than the last.

Categories: parenting, poetry, prose, writing

Tags: aging, creative nonfiction, mid-life crisis, mindfulness, nostalgia, parenting, prose, sentiment, William Pearse writer