I’ve been trying to get into a habit recently.
Before work in the morning I’ve been making myself leave the house. It sounds simple enough, but when you work from home it’s very easy for the day to begin without really noticing. Bed to laptop and suddenly I’m in it.
If you go out early enough you start to notice how many different mornings are happening at the same time.
School runs, commuters, people walking dogs, runners, sea swimmers, cafés just opening. Everyone moving through their own version of the day.
The other morning I changed my usual route and found myself walking towards a local park instead of the seafront.
That’s how I ended up in the middle of the school run.
Parents walking with children, either resistant, or racing ahead, dogs, bags and lots of noise. Everything moving with a rhythm and routine that belongs to people who live it every day.
It stopped me for a moment, not because anything dramatic happened, but because of what it represented.
A sharp reminder of ……..
The school run I wasn’t part of
I don’t think I’ve been avoiding school runs. It’s more that my life doesn’t naturally sit inside that routine. Suddenly finding myself in the middle of it felt slightly strange, like I’d wandered into someone else’s world.
For a moment I felt very much on the outside looking in.
I’m 49. I froze my eggs more than eight years ago and, a few years later, made the decision not to use them. It wasn’t one defining moment, more a gradual acceptance that motherhood wasn’t going to be part of my life.
Most of the time I’m completely at peace with that.
I’m proud of the life I’ve built. It looks different from the one I once imagined, but it’s full in ways I couldn’t have predicted.
Every so often though, however, something catches me off guard.
That morning it was the school run.
Watching everyone move with such familiarity, even in the chaos, I realised how naturally they belonged to that rhythm.
It wasn’t envy, or even regret, it was just recognising a life that was never going to be mine.
For a few minutes it brought a quiet sadness that I hadn’t felt in quite a while.
When I’m not in it, I notice it more
I’ve noticed something else as well.
When I’m busy with work, friends, conversations and everyday life, I don’t really think about any of this.
It’s not something that comes from being on your own, as it can just as easily happen when surrounded by people.
It tends to appear when there’s a shared world I’m not fully part of in that moment. When the conversation has a reference point that belongs more to other people than it does to me.
Like an observer rather than a participant.
That’s usually when I become more aware of where my own life sits alongside other people’s.
When you are included it means so much
Walking through the park that morning, there were feelings that came from somewhere else.
They were reminders of how special it is when people let you into their world.
Being inside someone’s family for an evening, or being part of a group. Spending time in community spaces like Artists Open House, or standing around after a run talking to people you know. Those relationships where you feel genuinely included rather than on the edge of things.
Those moments feel different when you don’t automatically sit inside a ready-made structure of your own in quite the same way that some people do.
When your life doesn’t fit into typical structures, joining someone else’s feels extraordinary.
Perhaps that’s why they stay with me.
What I took from that morning
As I carried on walking, the feeling passed and I began to switch into the rhythm of my own day.
Nothing had changed, I still won’t have the school run, or that particular aspect of everyday life.
Instead, I have a different one.
One where I can walk before work, swim, or run and notice things like this and one where I’ve had to build meaning in ways I hadn’t expected.
I’ve realised moments like that morning, don’t mean we’re living the wrong life. They simply remind us that every life contains versions of itself that never happened, or paths that changed unexpectedly. Some are the result of choices we made. Others are the result of circumstances we never would have chosen at all.
Perhaps acceptance isn’t about pretending those feelings never appear. It’s recognising that gratitude and sadness can exist alongside one another. We can love the life we’ve built and still occasionally wonder about the one that might have been.
That morning didn’t make me question my life. It simply reminded me that being at peace with something doesn’t mean you’ll never feel it again.
Sometimes an ordinary moment catches you by surprise.
You notice it, you let yourself feel it and then, gently, you carry on walking.
