Getting a 12-year-old off to school at 7am, I wonder if I’ve represented all the food groups at breakfast. I simultaneously (and guiltily) cook mac and cheese on the stove to pack in his lunch and hope he eats it. I separate colors and whites, start a load of laundry before we leave. Remind Jeb that texting friends can happen after he’s washed his breakfast dishes, not before. I make the bed and create a mental checklist of the day’s to-do’s, while eyeballing Jeb’s school-ready progress out of the corner of my right eye. He’s fiddling with the dog. Clock says 7:32. We need to leave.

“Meet you in the car!” He’s heading downstairs, ready to go. I secure doors, grab phone, purse, sunglasses. Slip on flip-flops, and trot downstairs.

Sunlight illuminates a cluster of white ginger flowers. I pause. They drip with an early morning rain. I veer to the blooms, away from the waiting car. These choices, this moment, it is the stuff of what all of the Masters and poets speak.

Now?

If not now, when?

I stop and smell the ginger flowers.