Against the current.

Last summer I turned forty. I am embarrassed to admit that I experienced the classic angst associated with reaching that fateful milestone. I had the stereotypical feeling of beginning to run out of time.

When I was introduced to Commonweal readers as a columnist in 1993, Peggy Steinfels described the various jobs I had held up to that point and added, "And only twenty-nine years old!" As my fortieth birthday approached, I panicked, fretting that if that punch line were being written today, it might read, "That's all, and she's already forty years old!"

I had an amusing experience leading up to my birthday, the perfect corollary to my anxious sense of time slipping away. I was hurriedly winding our grandfather clock when, in my carelessness, the pendulum disconnected. The hands of the clock began to spin so fast that each minute the clock chimed a new hour. I stood there helpless, literally watching time's swift passage, unable to do anything to halt it. I had to laugh.

I usually respond to time moving too quickly in one of two ways: either I decide to pack my day too full, what a dear friend refers to as my "carpe diem girl" mode; or I stand locked before its inexorable whirling, lamenting that I can't find the time to finish my doctorate, get to the food warehouse for a month's supply, or achieve some other tangible accomplishment. In both cases, I fail to savor the moment because I'm too tense--from doing too much or not enough.

For my fortieth birthday, my family and some friends went whitewater rafting in Oregon. It turned out to be a fitting antidote for my anxious forebodings. On a rafting trip, everything takes place according to "river time." We woke with the sun, ate when hungry, and turned in at nightfall. Too often, I am like the wild salmon swimming upstream. I fight against the current, thinking I can do more than time allows. On our trip, it became clear just how sensible it is to follow the river's lead. Taking on the rapids in a kayak, I was required to respect the water's power and to paddle furiously to avoid being capsized. My mantras became: "Strong arms, Liz, strong arms," and "Just keep paddling, just keep paddling." Moving with the river can mean paddling like mad to stay the course or letting go and allowing the momentum to carry you. At other times, what's best is simply to step out of the river, let it pass, and pause for refreshment and rest. Being on river time means spending precious little effort trying to make headway by vainly swimming against the flow.

Taking my cue from river time, I hope to spend my forties approaching time less as a foe to be seized and tamed than as a power to be recognized, respected, and treasured. I do not want to waste my time worrying or being anxious about it, or to squander it by being overly busy. I want to take the long view. Life is short, but God is from everlasting to everlasting. The way to prevent time from slipping away is to grasp what lasts. In his poem "Carpe Diem," Shakespeare asks "What is love? 'tis not hereafter." But as Christians know, 'tis love that is the greatest of things that lasts. Tapping into the flow of God's eternal love means synchronizing myself to God's time. Jean-Pierre de Caussade, the eighteenth-century Jesuit spiritual writer, calls this sort of timing "the sacrament of the present moment." For Caussade, every moment is full of the possibility of touching the eternal now of God's loving presence.

That our life is short and fleeting--but that God is everlasting--certainly puts everything in perspective. It takes the pressure off my sense of having limited time and capabilities. From God's perspective, all happens in good time. For me, then, arriving at such a sense of time will require greater patience--one of love's most graceful qualities. Yes, I would still like to finish the doctorate I have put on hold to home-school my children, and perhaps I will paddle like crazy to do so. But what I accomplish in that regard will be as nothing compared to recognizing God's ever-present love.

In my forties, I hope to become more like Peter, my husband, who always has time for me, even in the midst of his busy days; more like our son Brian, who respects time and gets places without having to rush; more like his brother Collin, who makes spaces in his day to pause and to refuel; and more like our daughter Nora, who enjoys time and lives completely in the present. Perhaps then I will truly become a genuine carpe diem girl.

Liz Leibold McCloskey, a former Commonweal intern and columnist, lives in Virginia.