The days are long but the years are short.” Those words — coined by author Gretchen Rubin as part of her “Happiness Project” — have become almost a truism for parents of young children. They’re a slightly less infuriating way of reminding us that the days of toting car seats and handling tantrums don’t last — kind of like the older ladies in the supermarket who smile fondly at a screaming toddler and say, “Enjoy it while you can.” Really? Has anyone ever actually enjoyed hauling a screaming child through the check-out line? While some children have easier tempers than others, or maybe just personalities that mesh better with their parents, they all have their moments, good and bad. In our lives, in most lives I’d like to think, the good far outweighs the bad: the hugs and kisses, the giggles, the dandelion bouquets, the triumphs of learning to read and to ride a bike. I’d like to say that I appreciate all of this more with Teresa. After all, I know how fast it goes. I look at Teresa and see Caroline a dozen years ago. Really, weren’t both of them infants just a few days ago? When did Frank’s voice get deeper, and when did he get taller than me? I love my teenagers. I love their independence, that for the most part they can get themselves to school and back, and even that they can babysit and take out the trash and vacuum and do laundry. I know that in a little more than a year, Caroline will start college, and her life will be even more separate from ours. Frank will follow not long behind, and, in what will seem like the blink of an eye, Teresa will be leaving childhood. In the meantime, though, the days are long. There’s getting up and showered and dressed by 6 a.m., to get to work early since I leave early to get Teresa after school. Some days Frank has hockey practice that ends at 10:40 p.m., meaning we get home sometime around 11:30 p.m. There’s not always enough time in between to sleep. Frank reminds me that he’ll be old enough to drive in two years; in three years, the city of Chicago curfew will no longer apply to him, so it would even be legal for him to drive himself after 11 p.m. Those drives to and from hockey practice are when Frank talks most: about the professional sports he watches on TV and online, about his own sports, about school and friends. I don’t really want that to end. Caroline is more likely to just sit at the kitchen table and talk, if she can get a word in edgewise when Teresa’s up. I hope she keeps doing that when she’s in college, even if she’s going to school halfway across the country. She’ll still come home for breaks, at least for a while. Teresa talks all the time, telling us about the butterflies and ladybugs in her classroom (for someone afraid of bugs, insect week at school was a challenge) and singing silly songs. These years, indeed, are short.