Skip to main content

41,000 PIECES OF PROOF I WASN’T PAYING ATTENTION





The other day, I decided to free up space on my phone.

A sentence that sounds responsible. Mature. Like I have my life together.

Which is how I ended up discovering I have 41,000 photos and videos.

Forty-one thousand.

That’s not a camera roll.
That’s evidence.

Sixteen years of it.

The first one?
A snowstorm. December 26th. Back when Erin and I were living in Stony Brook. 

Everything looked quieter then.
Simpler.
We looked younger. Both in our thirties.

(Well… I did. Erin, obviously, signed some kind of agreement with time itself.)

And then I started scrolling.

And I didn’t stop.

Not for hours. Not for days.

I went through all of it.

Every blurry photo.
Every accidental screenshot.
Every video you forget you took… until it hits you like a memory you didn’t ask permission to feel again.

And somewhere along the way, it stopped being “cleaning out my phone”…

…and started feeling like I was sitting in the front row of my own life.

Watching it back.

Like Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Past…except the ghost didn’t need to show me anything.

I had already been there.

I just hadn’t been paying attention.

Unedited.

Unfiltered.

No background music to tell me how to feel.

Just… me.

And us.

And everything in between...

Some clips made me laugh out loud.

The kind of laugh that surprises you because it hasn’t visited in a while.

Others… didn’t ask.

They just walked right in.

Regret.
Shame.
Moments I wish I could re-record.
Scenes I wish I had handled differently.

And then- without warning- 

joy.

The kind that hurts a little when you realize you didn’t know it was joy at the time.

It felt like an audit.

Not of my bank account.

Of my attention.

And I’m not sure I passed...


Because here’s what I kept noticing:

In almost every memory that now feels beautiful…

I don’t remember knowing it was beautiful when I was living it.

I was there.

But I wasn’t there.

I was thinking about the next thing.
The next problem.
The next version of myself I thought I needed to become.

Meanwhile- life was happening.

Without my full permission.
But also… without my full presence...


There were videos of the girls when they were little.

The ones where I’d take them somewhere they probably shouldn’t have been…

doing things they definitely shouldn’t have been doing…

recording the whole thing like I was documenting a crime I was actively committing.

And at the end, like clockwork, I’d say:

“Okay… what do we say?”

And they’d look into the camera, smiling like tiny co-conspirators:

“Don’t tell Mom.”

And then I’d send it to Erin.

Because apparently I enjoy consequences.

Every. Single. Time.

#DontTellMom

I sat there watching those clips and many others…

laughing…

and then crying so fast it felt like emotional whiplash.

Because those moments?

They didn’t feel like “big moments” when they were happening.

They felt like an average day...


That’s the part no one tells you.

Life doesn’t announce itself while you’re in it.

It doesn’t say, “Hey- just so you know- this right here? This is one of the days you’re going to miss.”

It just… happens.

Quietly.

While you’re busy.

While you’re stressed.

While you’re trying to get through it...


And somewhere between photo 12,438 and video 33,907…

I realized something that landed a little heavier than I wanted it to:

I don’t think I appreciated my life while I was living it.

Not fully.

Not consistently.

Not in the way I do now… watching it from a distance I can’t undo.

I appreciated the milestones.

The births.
The trips.
The posed photos where everyone’s smiling like we’ve got it all figured out.

But the in-between?

The ordinary days dressed up as nothing special?

I rushed them.

I survived them.

I complained about them.

I didn’t honor them...


And now?

I would give anything to step back into just one of those completely average days…

knowing what I know now.

To sit in the noise.
To stay a little longer.
To notice...


Here’s the strange grace in all of it:

The photos didn’t change.

I did.

And now I get to decide—

what the next 41,000 look like.

Not perfect.

Not always happy.

There will be hard days.

There will be videos I don’t want to rewatch.

There will be moments that stretch longer than I’d like.

But there will also be laughter.
And chaos.
And ordinary Tuesdays pretending to be nothing.

And this time…

I want to be there for them.

Not just physically.

But fully....


So if you have a minute- 

open your camera roll.

Scroll.

Not to delete.

To remember.

To see your life for what it actually is:

Beautiful.
Broken.
Messy.
Holy.

And then- close it.

Look up.

Because the moment you’ll wish you appreciated later…

is probably happening right now.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wooden Tulips

  Wooden Tulips T he first time I was ever really afraid- the kind of afraid that makes your body cold from the inside out- was the night Sadie was born. She was supposed to come on Valentine’s Day. Of course she didn’t. Sadie and Erin are both stubborn, so naturally she showed up early. I remember kissing Erin’s forehead, paper hearts taped to the hospital window, me rehearsing the one job I’d been assigned: cut the cord. I was ready to nail it. Dad of the Year. Opening scene. Cue applause. And then- she was here. Tiny cries, a flurry of nurses, scissors in my hand, cord cut, done. Erin was drifting in and out from the C-section meds, crying, laughing, floating. I was waiting to hold our baby. Our brand-new everything. And then a nurse leaned in. Whispered. “I’m sorry. I think your baby has Down Syndrome.” That was the first thing anyone said about my daughter. Not “She’s beautiful.” Not “Congratulations.” Just: I’m sorry. I didn’t even know what that meant yet. How could she k...
3 comments
Read more

The Jacket

E very man has one item of clothing his wife has begged him to throw out for years. Mine was a light-blue jean jacket with a fake white cotton collar. Erin hated that jacket with the kind of passion most people save for politics or pineapple on pizza. I’d had it for years. Presidents had come and gone. My career had risen, collapsed, and tried to rise again. Our kids had grown taller than Erin — which isn’t saying much, but still. And through it all, that jacket kept hanging by the door like a stubborn dog that refused to die. It was hideous. I can admit that now. The collar looked like dirty clouds glued on by a kindergartner’s craft project gone wrong. The denim was the exact shade of regret you get when you bleach jeans one cycle too many. And still - I wore it everywhere. School events. Grocery runs. Parent-teacher conferences. Probably even funerals. It wasn’t clothing. It was my emotional support jacket. Erin tried everything: gentle hints, sarcastic digs, quiet donation runs tha...
3 comments
Read more

The Spirit of Division (and Why We’re All Being Played)

  W e hear stories all the time about the supernatural—miraculous healings, near-death experiences, strange whispers in the night that make even skeptics pause. But how do we know what’s real? That’s what investigative journalist (and former atheist) Lee Strobel asks in his new book Seeing the Supernatural . He dives into evidence of the unseen world and invites us to consider something both ancient and terrifyingly current: What if God really does still rule over the spiritual realm—angels, demons, all of it? And maybe that’s where we need to start. Because the real battle today? It’s not just political, cultural, or ideological. It’s spiritual. We like to think politics is about ideas—policy, vision, leadership. But underneath the hashtags and press conferences, something darker is happening. Something feeding on us. Every election cycle, every argument at the dinner table, every “unfriend” click on Facebook— it all fuels a spirit that thrives on outrage. That sp...
Post a Comment
Read more