The moon has been watching me for as long as I’ve been looking up at it.
It’s seen me change in ways I could never have predicted, yet I can’t help but wonder if it’s also seen parts of me that have never truly shifted. There are nights, like tonight, when I catch a glimpse of it and feel an old, familiar pull; a call to remember, to pause, and to recognize that there’s a larger thread weaving through all of us, stretching across generations, and even time itself.
I think back to when I was a child, barefoot in the damp grass, the soft evening breeze tangling in my hair as I tilted my head back, staring at its quiet glow. I can still picture the way the night air wrapped around me, thick with the scent of earth and summer, how the sky felt endless, like it could swallow me whole. I remember the wonder I felt, convinced that if I just reached high enough, if I stretched my arms and stood on the tips of my toes, I might be able to graze its silver light with my fingertips. There was something about that moment; the vastness of the night and the closeness of the moon, that made me believe, with childlike certainty, that the impossible was within reach. I think I believed then, in that innocent way only children do, that everything had a way of being close enough if you just tried hard enough.
Years passed, and the moon found me again. This time, I was older, restless, lying awake in my childhood bedroom, the sheets twisted around me, thoughts tangled just as much as my body in the bed. The window was cracked just enough to let in the hush of midnight, the cool whisper of air that carried secrets only the dark could hold. And in the silence, I whispered mine to the moon; the dreams I wasn’t yet brave enough to share, the fears I couldn’t speak out loud, the unspoken longings I couldn’t yet name. The moon was still there, steady and constant, its light slanting through the window, as if it had been waiting for me to need it again. I imagined its light bending toward me, imagined it listening to my quiet thoughts, carrying them across the sky, keeping them safe until I was ready to claim them.
Even now, standing outside with my son on a quiet evening, I feel that same sense of wonder, of connection. His small fingers wrap around mine, warm and steady, and he tilts his face upward, his eyes wide with the kind of certainty only children possess. His voice, full of delight, cuts through the evening stillness.
“The moon’s following us,” he says, pointing, a delighted laugh slipping between his words.
I smile, remembering when I believed the same thing. And in some small way, I think I still do. I believe in the moon’s quiet presence, its watchful glow, and its steady pull. There’s a magic in the way the world can feel so much smaller when you’re a child, a magic I see reflected in my son’s face. He’s right, I think. The moon is following us, in a way that only the moon can. It follows us across time, across space, across lifetimes.
And in this quiet moment, beneath its silver light, I wonder: Does the moon remember me? Does it remember the little girl who once reached for it, the teenager who confided in it, the woman now standing here, watching her own child look up with the same sense of wonder? Does it see the way time has shaped me? Or does it still see every version of me at once; layered, overlapping, unchanged beneath its glow?
Perhaps the moon remembers, as all things do, in ways we cannot always comprehend. It remembers not just the versions of ourselves that we have been but the versions we will become. It holds our stories within its quiet glow, a constant companion that watches over us, marking the moments in between.
It remembers my mother at my age, standing beneath it with me in her arms, her voice soft with the same wonder, the same awe. It remembers her mother before that, and all the mothers before her, each one pausing beneath its glow, whispering their wishes into the night, carrying their hopes, their dreams, and their fears. We’ve all stood beneath the same sky, bathed in the same soft silver light, sharing a quiet connection, a quiet knowing. And through it all, the moon remains, unchanging, watching, remembering.
I hope, one day, my son will stand here without me, his own child tugging at his hand, pointing upward in wonder, asking the same questions I once asked. I hope, when that day comes, the moon will still be watching, as it has always been, steady and constant, reminding him of the way it watches over all of us, generations passing in its light, and how we are part of something much larger than ourselves. I hope, too, that the moon will remember. It’s seen every version of us, and in some way, it always will.
There’s a quiet comfort in knowing that we are watched over, in knowing that there is something beyond our reach, beyond our understanding, that remembers us. And maybe, just maybe, that’s all we need to carry us through the uncertain moments, the silent spaces where we lose sight of ourselves. To know that there’s something constant in the universe, something that’s seen every version of us, every change, every moment of wonder and loss. The moon, steady in the sky, will always remember us. And in turn, we will remember it.
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