Granted, it took me months to finally purchase Trace Adkins’ Greatest Hits “American Man” Volume II. I listen to all kinds of music, even country, and I’ve always liked Adkins, but the main reason I bought this CD was because of the song “You’re Gonna Miss This.” I remember hearing the song several times on the radio earlier in the year, and of course seeing Adkins sing the song at the end of Donald Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice.” I hadn’t listened to the song for a long time and I just bought the CD and listened to it several times already.
It’s the words of the song that really struck me. The first verse talks about a girl who can’t wait to grow up and her mom tells her that she’s going to miss him. The second verse has the girl as a newlywed and telling her dad that the small apartment is only temporary while she talks about babies and a bigger house etc. Her father tells her to slow down, he’s going to miss it. The final verse is five years later with the woman apologizing to the plumber for her house being occupied by her with the phone ringing, the baby crying and another child screaming. He tells her that he doesn’t care since she has two babies of her own, one 36 and the other 23. He tells her it’s hard to believe, but you’re going to miss it.
The chorus after each verse is:
you are going to miss this
You’re gonna want this back
You’re going to wish these days
it had not happened so fast
These are some good times
So take a good look around you
You may not know now
But you’re gonna miss this
Wow Trace, this song reminds me of another song on the CD, “Songs About Me”. But this song is about all of us.
I find myself thinking about my younger days. Man, I wanted to grow up and get out of high school and get out of the house sometimes when I was young. Boy do I miss some of those days now that I look back on it. I remember sometimes I hated the army. FTA was a rallying cry that didn’t mean “Take Top’s advice” as a friend of mine told the first sergeant. (Above) one day when they surprised him writing his initials in the snow behind the barracks. I can remember times in college, times in Japan, times in Korea, many times during law school, not wanting to be there, how I wanted things to change. I look back now and miss those times so much. Well, maybe not in law school, but it doesn’t seem as bad now as I thought it would at the time.
Now that I’m a parent, this lesson hits home even stronger. My little girl, Cosette, is four years old and has just started preschool. She is growing up so fast and I already miss some of those days when she was little. She still enjoys all the new things we do every day, especially since she’s like her dad in that she loves books. She is trying very hard to learn to read and write. The first day of preschool she told her teacher that she still couldn’t read well. Her teacher told her that she was fine, and then she told my wife and me that it wasn’t until kindergarten that they started teaching zoophonics, a system for learning letter sounds and phonics. I thought to myself, “she already knows the sounds that all the letters make, by next year and kindergarten she will be reading. I guess she will be ahead of the curve like me.”
So while I really enjoy helping her with her reading and writing, I also miss some of the things that when she was very little now happen.
But here’s the kicker. There are times when I’m pressured with work, bills, writing projects, my teaching, and other goals I’m working to achieve that I’m short on the time I have for her. Tonight, for example, I only have a short time to come home from work, eat, spend some time with her, and then go to the gym to work out and teach hapkido. I think of the Adkins song and realize I’m going to miss this. I am going to miss these times and therefore I need to make sure I take as much time as possible because it will go by so quickly.
Everyone tells the younger generation that time passes faster as we get older. They say it because it’s true. Each year goes faster than the last. It makes the “The time is now, the place is here” lessons that Dan Millman teaches in his Peaceful Warrior workouts even more important. It’s not that they’re not always important, it’s just that as you get older you pay more attention to it.
Or at least you should. Some people don’t, and that’s sad. Because they are the ones who will probably miss it the most. Miss what? Miss life. I recently wrote about life, after learning about a friend’s 41-year-old relative who died of a heart attack. We must not miss life. We shouldn’t be too eager to get to the next stage, because believe me, you are coming too fast, that is if you are lucky enough to get to the next stage. Many people write about this concept in different ways. I have written on the subject and I also talk about it. I am sure that I will continue to write and speak on the subject in the future in various ways. Because? Because it is important. It’s very important! Thanks to Trace Adkins for recording this song written by Lee Thomas Miller and Ashley Gorley to remind us once again how important it is to live life and live in the present. To enjoy what we have, because we are going to miss it. There are other songs, other books, other lessons on this very subject, and maybe I will write about them in the future as well. I’m also glad I bought the CD of another song that I also need to write about. But that is for another day.
For now, remember, the time is now, the place is here. Live your life. Live now. When you look back, “You’re going to miss this.”