I strive to fill the hours, build a routine, drown out the seconds ticking away. But filling time isn't living and I want to live

I don't know when it happened, but as I look out of my window onto the world, I now see myself slowly chugging down a siding whose rails reach an ominous stop, somewhere out of view.

What happened? I used to whizz along, stopping at the odd station to gather up fresh ideas; energized by the textures and colors and barely visible signs of potential growth all around me. When did the points change to send me monotonously chugging towards a dead end? Who pushed the lever?

I used to journey through life, living every moment. I dreamed of marriage and found my bashert. Longed to have children and was blessed with child after child. I took on projects and did my bit, gave where I could, turned out meal after meal, and just managed to win the race against the ever-filling washing basket.

This chugging self feels breathless at the thought of it. “Relax,” it says, “Slow down. Do something for yourself for once. Enjoy life.”

“But where are you taking me? What has happened to all the excitement, the freshness, the growth?”

Is it my empty nest? Can hormone changes really take over your whole being? Does the realization that your one-time heroes have disintegrated, challenged to the hilt by old age knock you off your tracks? Perhaps it's just that everything comes at once. The noticeable wrinkle greets the oldest child's wedding; the winding down of fertility coincides with the time you notice Mommy repeating herself; the wispy graying hairs herald in the first winter with achy joints. If only I could have time to digest this process bit by bit, perhaps I would be able to find my way and keep on going.