the halcyon years

We just got back from the beach where I read Water for Elephants.  I loved that book.  I especially love this quote that comes at the end of the book, as an old man in his nineties looks back at his life:

"Those were the salad days, the halcyon years! The sleepless nights, the wailing babies; the days the interior of the house looked like it had been hit by a hurricane; the times I had five kids, a chimpanzee, and a wife in bed with fever. Even when the fourth glass of milk got spilled in a single night, or the shrill screeching threatened to split my skull, or when I was bailing out some son or other--or, in one memorable instance, Bobo (the chimpanzee)--from a minor predicament at the police station, they were good years, grand years. But it all zipped by. One minute we were in it up to our eyeballs, and next thing we knew the kids were borrowing the car and fleeing the coop for college. And now, here I am. In my nineties and alone." 
~excerpted from Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen 


The salad days (which I had to look up because I had no idea what it meant) refer to a time of youthful inexperience.  The stage we are in right now! The halcyon years - the prosperous years, the golden years... I love this quote - it his reminds me to slow down.  To enjoy these crazy busy days where I have more to-do lists than time.  It reminds me that I will look back and miss these days - I hope to sit and look at the end of my life and say that these were good years, grand years.  Teach me Lord to number my days, that I may gain a heart of wisdom (Ps. 90:12).  Teach me Lord to enjoy each day you have given me - to know that this stage won't last forever.  I am so thankful for these salad days, these halcyon years!