I’ve noticed lately that time is starting to pass more quickly than my brain can fully comprehend. I find myself stuttering every time I say, “Two thousand, uh, 10.” I frequently misrepresent my age, unintentionally subtracting a year or two. I think of the ‘90s as being “a few years ago.” (News flash: Even 1999 was 11 years ago, time-impaired self!)

I place the blame for this phenomenon squarely on the shoulders of my son Noah, who has this ridiculous thing he keeps doing called getting older. He’s very sneaky about it — he’ll do it in the night when I’m sleeping, or while I’m away on a trip.

Once, upon arriving home from a camping weekend, he told me about all the new things he had done. Then he informed me the reason he was not scared to try those new things was that he was “so much bigger now than I was last week!” Told me outright, just like that! DO YOU SEE WHAT I AM DEALING WITH HERE?

Father Time sure isn’t letting up for one second either, that jerk. And that’s really a shame, because I could use a quick breather before diving headlong into my newest mind-boggle: In the fall, Noah starts kindergarten.
This is troublesome, and not just because typing that sentence made me sprout three new gray hairs. It’s troublesome because I am completely ignorant when it comes to the public school system. Turns out it’s generally frowned upon to just show up sometime in the fall at the nearest school’s front door with your kid and a backpack full of pencils and a note that says, “THIS IS NOAH. HE NEEDS LEARNIN’. THANKS, TEACH!”

Apparently, there are things you have to do before school actually starts. There are lines to stand in, papers to fill out, I.D.s to check, records to file. It’s the kind of checklist you work on, all the while thinking, “I thought the grown-ups did this. Where are the grown-ups?” And then you realize — WHAMMO — old Father Time has smacked you across the face once again.

Photos: Rachel Reiff Ellis

There’s a scene in Pixar’s Finding Nemo where Nemo’s father Marlin and his traveling companion Dory discover turtles who ride through the great wide ocean on the Eastern Australian Current, a superhighway-slash-waterslide that shoots them through the much stiller surrounding sea to their destination.

One shot in the scene shows a pair of fish hovering right outside the current, waiting to merge into the flow. In one quick movement, the fish jump from their waiting place into the rush of water and are quickly whisked away by the jet stream and out of the picture.

Those two fish? That’s Noah and me, hovering just outside the public education system with our fins flapping. Come August, it will be just a blink of an eye before whoosh, off we’ll be zipped off into uncharted waters.
Only, I doubt there will be any laid-back turtle guides hanging around to let me hop a ride on their shells while they yell, “RIGHTEOUS! RIGHTEOUS!” as we barrel through year one. (Side note: It seems to me that your kindergarten registration packet should include this. You know, “Here’s the bus route, here’s the lunch menu, here’s your groovy turtle. Enjoy the ride!” But I digress.)

Instead, it looks like I’ll be left to my own devices. Le sigh.

But let’s be honest. It’s not the line standing, or the paperwork, or even The Man that’s got me down about all this. It’s the fact that Steve Miller (and his Band) was right: Time does keep on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’ into the future. And it feels more and more slippery with every passing birthday Noah celebrates.
Wasn’t he just born? Didn’t I just get married? Wasn’t I just sitting in the auditorium listening to Nancy Reagan tell me to Just Say No? Where was my warning? Where was the sign in my bathroom cautioning me that “Objects In Mirror May Age Faster Than They Appear?” Not cool, Father Time. Not cool.

Ironically though, while Noah is a considerable accelerator of this great existential crisis, he’s also the reason I can face it head on. Kids give us good reason to buck up and get over ourselves and at least pretend to be the grown-ups, even if it makes us feel like grade-A poseurs. Which is probably exactly what our parents felt like when we started kindergarten. Mom and Dad, the jig is up.

So, all right, I’ll get over myself. I’ll muster up my fishy courage in the pre-kindergarten water until it’s time to join in with the flow. I’ll take Noah’s fin in mine and we’ll dive in, two rookies hurtling into the unfamiliar. And it will all be OK. In fact, Father Time, I’m looking right at you as I declare: It will be righteous.

Rachel Reiff Ellis lives in Decatur with her husband and two kids, Noah, 5, and Rosie, a fiesty 1-year-old whose hair looks pretty much exactly like David Bowie’s. She writes about her experiences with the inanity and absurdity that is parenthood at www.yestertimeblog.com.