I came across a quotation the other day that caused me to ponder a bit: Always is a habit. Forever is a hope. Never is a boundary.
Those words carried me back to when our kids were growing up. Ruth and I leaned on them often. Never was the one we used most. One of them would make some glaring misstep, and one of us would say, “Never do that again.” They’d nod, promise to do better, and sometimes they did… sometimes they didn’t. They were kids, after all. But nothing they did could ever make us love them less. From the moment they arrived, it was love at first sight. And when our three grandchildren came along, we fell all over again. One by one.
One of my favorite “never again” moments still makes me smile. David set up a beachfront fireworks display on one of our trips to Myrtle Beach. He had a couple dozen bottle rockets stuck in the sand and planned to light them one at a time. He lit the first, sparks flew, igniting a bag of firecrackers and the other rockets. Explosions went off up and down the line. Everyone ran for cover. That was our first and last fireworks extravaganza. He never did that again.
Always was our way of nudging them toward good habits. “Always brush your teeth before bed.” “Always look both ways before crossing the street.” “Always be home on time.” That last one became our mantra, though I’ll admit it wasn’t always their practice.
And then there were the forevers. Those were the hardest. We wanted happiness, health, and love to last without end. But life has a way of surprising us, and we didn’t always take care of ourselves the way we should. We knew better, but poor choices crept in. If we had always honored our health, and never strayed, our forevers might have felt more certain.
In the end, those three words helped shape our lives: never set the limits, always shaped the habits, and forever gave us something worth reaching for. Together, they told the story of how we tried to live, love, and pass on the parts of life that matter most.
I’m still trying, one day at a time.