(Photo: The heavy snow outside my school in Daejeon – absolutely vanished the next day)

For everything, there is a season. 

Familiar words and yet, no one warns you of the day that you suddenly just can’t do things as naturally any more. 

Aging is feared and shunned in our world. Poked fun of to hide our own insecurities or ignored to the point of absurdity. Just take enough pills, exercise, eat enough good food – you won’t have to face the day you can’t do something. 

Age is just a number, right?

But for me, it wasn’t age. Or, really, wasn’t just age that caused me to have to reevaluate my life. 

A reckless drunk driver and four broken bones and a year and some change and I find myself questioning things I used to do so freely. 

Ice skating is no longer just a fun, relaxing activity. Suddenly I have to think through what I would do if I fell. Would the screws in my ankle hold up? Would my knee – never quite healed properly – fracture further? Would the compression fracture in my spine suddenly send that restricting flare of pain through me, making it impossible to get up?

Would I make things worse?

It’s just ice skating.

But suddenly it isn’t “just” anything anymore. 

And I am so grateful that I am where I am today. God’s healing has been above and beyond where I thought I would be a year and a half ago. I can’t believe I can dance, run, and lift weights again. But I also can’t deny that I won’t ever be the same. 

I now evaluate each new physical activity with a caution and hesitation that I never had before, wondering if I can handle it. Should I try snowboarding? What if I twist the wrong way and break my ankle again? Old activities are treated with the same level of suspicion. I can’t say that I would be brave enough to again try a comet drop from a 15 foot aerial silk and trust the silk to catch me around the waist without my back seizing up in some serious way. That saddens me deeply because I miss silks and my circus shenanigans more every day. 

But I also don’t want to waste my time mourning what could have been because that doesn’t serve anyone either. Mourn what is lost, yes, but don’t wallow in self-pity. Age and change doesn’t mean that you are useless – it just means God is calling you to invest your time and resources in other ways. 

As people grow older, and I am the first to confess this, we can think that because we can’t do everything the way that we used to or we aren’t as attractive or active or whatever the excuse is, we waste our time wishing we could do (or try to get back to) what we used to do. 

But for everything, there is a season. I don’t want to miss the beauty of the season God has called me to because I spent it wishing I was still in the previous one. 

I want to listen to what the Lord has for me in the here and now. Maybe I’ll never get on a silks rig again, but maybe now I can spend my free time cultivating other hobbies like writing or dancing. 

How can this season show me more of God? How can I spend my days getting to know His plan more and learning more about His Word in ever deeper ways? After all, that is the point of this whole world anyway – to know Him, to love Him, to follow Him until at last I see Him in glory. 

And a life lived like that is never wasted.