Wistful

Webster's defines the word "wistful" as follows: 1. full of unfulfilled longing or desire; YEARNING 2. musingly sad: PENSIVE. The first definition pretty accurately describes something I felt this evening. I was downstairs walking on the treadmill when my littlest boy came downstairs to talk to me. While I was very mildly irritated by the disruption to my workout, I was still glad to see him. He was being very sweet and was concerned that our cat was too close to the treadmill. He chattered to me for a few minutes before heading back upstairs where Daddy and big brother were. As he paused by the door before going up the steps, it struck me how very little he still is. His head only comes up to about the height of the doorknob. And then it immediately hit me how quickly time is passing. I briefly tried (unsuccessfully) to imagine him as a teenager in the exact same spot, towering above the doorknob where only the top of him reaches today. The adjective that popped into my head at that moment was wistful. I know that when he is a big (teenage) boy, I will have many moments of wistfulness, thinking about how small and needy he used to be. Perhaps there will come a time where he won't have a pressing desire to talk to me in the middle of my workout, but I would gladly take the disruptions if only I could keep him small a little longer.