The Summer of the Second Grandchild

Ever since we found out about our second grandchild on Christmas Eve, our eyes have been focused on July (or August!). For months now, every conversation about summer plans has begun with “Well, it depends on Baby K…” We know the baby window is a wide one, but we are now two weeks from the due date, so I’m keeping my bag half-packed these days. My phone, usually silenced at night, has the volume turned up all the time now. And "casual" daily check-ins with my daughter have begun.

As we wait, I’ve been spending a lot of time looking forward to all that lies ahead: Holding sweet Baby K for the first time, watching my daughter and son-in-law as parents, happily taking day shifts and night shifts so Mom and Dad can get some rest… But I’ve also been looking back. It started with digging out my old journals to read the birth stories of each of my own kids. Then when I got to the journal from 1992, the year my daughter was born, I got lost in reading other entries, little snippets of our life back then. Those verbal snapshots gave me glimpses of our family that I’d nearly forgotten about.

 

Time is such a fluid thing. We’ve lived a whole life since I wrote those entries. Yet, sometimes, my days as a young mom seem like yesterday. I feel like if I can just look over my shoulder quickly enough, there we’ll all be—just as we were thirty years ago. I loved those days. But I also love these days. 

 

Our first grandchild, Jack, is nearing his first birthday, and what a happy, breathtaking year it’s been for my son and daughter-in-law (and for us!). Recently, I sent my daughter-in-law this text: “Good job, Mama. Your instincts were spot on.” She replied, “Aw thanks! I try but I don’t know what I’m doing.” I was struck by how true that is—in parenting and in life. We trust our instincts, try our hardest, but so much of the time we feel like we don’t know what we’re doing. 

 

Yesterday, my daughter and I spent the day hemming curtains for Baby K’s nursery. It involved a lot of measuring, marking, pinning, cutting, ironing, and finally sewing. We were as careful as could be, and the curtains look beautiful, but they are not perfect. At one point, early in the process, I said to her, “I wish there was one thing in my life where I could say, “Oh, this. I know exactly what to do.” There are probably some people with more expertise and more confidence who feel this way about things, but most of us just go along, doing the best we can and learning as we go. 

In the middle grade novel The Watsons Go to Birmingham by Christopher Paul Curtis, there’s a part I love where the main character, ten-year-old Kenny says, “Dad? I don’t think I’ll ever know what to do when I’m grown-up. It seems like you and Momma know a lot of things that I can never learn. It seems real scary. I don’t think I could ever be as good a parent as you guys.” His dad replies, “You’ll learn from the mistakes your mother and I make, just like we learned from the mistakes our parents made. I don’t have a single doubt that you and Byron and Joey will be much better parents than your mother and I ever were…”

 

I think this is true: each generation learns from the mistakes of the previous one. That doesn’t stop us from making our own mistakes along the way, but from what I’ve seen of this current generation of young adults and young parents, the future is in good hands. Thirty years from now when our kids’ kids are having kids, I hope and believe the world will be a cleaner, greener, safer, kinder place. 

But for now, for us, the countdown is on. See you soon, Baby K. We can't wait to meet you!

December Blues

1986

Ever since I became a mom, December has been a challenging month for me. Maybe not so much in those early days when the kids were very young and our world was very small. But once Ben started school and our little world started to expand, December ramped up with everything that makes the holiday season the holiday season: piano open classes, chorus and band concerts, church plays, friend parties, family visits, present buying, and cookie baking. Added to all of that, for me, was always end-of-the-semester paper reading and grading. There were some years that were extra tough: the year we discovered our middle son’s Christmas tree allergy when he broke out in hives and spent the holidays in an oatmeal bath, the year our furnace broke and the kids were sick, the year my dad died. As the kids grew older and headed off to college, holiday piano classes and high school concerts disappeared from our schedules, but we still drove to college events and games and geared up for having the kids home not just for Christmas but for winter break, so those Decembers were still bubbling with activity and challenging in new ways. 

We are in a new season now, and this is feeling like the most challenging December of all. The kids have grown up. They have their own lives, their own homes, their own friends, and the beginnings of their own traditions. I suppose the change has been occurring subtly over the past couple of years. Our middle son, who is not a teacher and doesn’t have a long break to stretch out into, hasn’t arrived until Christmas Day the past couple of years—he and his girl spend Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with her family. But our oldest lives in town, and up until last year, our youngest, who went from college to grad school to her first year of teaching, still spent a good bit of her Christmas break at home with us, so things felt a lot like they always had. But this year our girl is married. She and her husband are trying to juggle visits with both families along with her husband-the-coach’s basketball practice and game schedule. As a result, they’ll be home for about thirty-six hours this year. Our middle son and his girl will be here even less time over Christmas (but will be back for New Year’s). And I’m struggling in my attempt to adjust to it all. 

Although we got the tree the day after Thanksgiving (with the kids), and I decorated it and the house over the next few days, and although along with grading papers, I’ve been busily planning meals, buying groceries, wrapping presents, and baking cookies, I haven’t been feeling all that merry this year. Oh, I’ve listened to Christmas music and even watched a couple of Christmas movies, but my eyes and heart have really only been focused on the little window of time that all the kids will be here—I’ve just been waiting. I know, I know, the Christmas season, Advent, has always been about waiting, watching, anticipating, hoping. And I love that—the way the world prepares and almost holds its breath as it approaches Christmas Eve. But what I’ve been doing is different. I’ve been holding back, saving everything (the candles, the cookies, the celebrating) until the kids get here, and I've been fretting about how short the time together will be. I know why: from December '86, when we put infant Ben in his Christmas stocking, until December '16, the first time in thirty years that I’m not going to be filling Christmas stockings, December has been all about them, the kids. But what I’m slowly realizing is that now, somehow, it has to start being about us, my husband and me. We have to forge new traditions for the two of us, find new ways of celebrating the season. To aim all of our Christmas energy on the few hours the kids will be home isn’t fair to them or to us. The time they are home will always be my favorite part, but I need to learn to spread Christmas out in my mind and heart. I need to stop waiting and start enjoying December. I need to go ahead and light the candles, eat the cookies,  and drink the Christmas tea. Then Christmas with the kids can just be whatever it is in any given year, a week-long party or a few precious hours together. It doesn’t need to carry all the weight of my hopes and dreams and expectations. It can just be merry.

2015

Our Third Son

Photo by Tim Nichols

Do you remember the book Chester's Way by Kevin Henkes? It's about a little mouse named Chester who had his own way of doing things. Chester's best friend Wilson liked all the same things. "Chester and Wilson. Wilson and Chester. That's the way it was." The book goes on to describe all the fun things Chester and Wilson did together, but then one day Lilly moves into the neighborhood, and Lilly has her own way of doing things. Chester and Wilson aren't too sure about Lilly at first. But after she saves them from some bullies, Chester and Wilson realize they can learn a few things from Lilly and her way of doing things. They also see that life is more fun with Lilly, and soon the three of them are inseparable. "Chester and Wilson and Lilly. Lilly and Wilson and Chester. That's the way it was." Until the very end of the book when "Victor moves into the neighborhood . . . "

That story reminds me of our story. It started with Ben, who had his own way of doing things. When Darton came along, he fit right in. Ben and Darton, Darton and Ben. That's the way it was. And life was good. Then Emily arrived on the scene. From the beginning, Emily had her own way of doing things. As time passed, the boys realized they could learn a thing or two from their baby sister, and they also saw that life was more fun with three. Ben, Darton, and Emily. Emily, Darton, and Ben. That's the way it was. For years. And years. I referred to them as B, D, E, and rattled off "two sons and a daughter" whenever anyone asked about my kids.

And then Tucker showed up. At first he was Darton's teammate and friend. But then, at cross-country camp, he got to know Emily, and before long Tucker started spending more and more time on Eagle Street. It turned out he had his own way of doing things. For starters, he likes mild chicken wings and doesn't eat broccoli. But we soon discovered that Tucker made family dinners, game nights, tennis matches, road trips, and holidays more fun, and we also realized we could learn a thing or two from the new guy. When our fifteen-year-old dog was dying, Tucker was the one who gently said, "You've gotta let him go." When our front door was sticking and wouldn't open the whole way, Tucker said, "I can fix that," and he did. And most important, he loves our girl and knows how to make her happy. So now we have three sons and a daughter, and we couldn't be happier about it. Ben, Darton, Emily and Tucker. Tucker, Emily, Darton and Ben. That's the way it is. (Until Emma moves into the neighborhood . . . but that's a story for a future entry!)

Photo by Nicole Mason

Emily Krauza?

"A son is a son until he takes a wife, but a daughter's a daughter all of her life."

The first time I heard this saying was on an episode of That Girl when Mrs. Hollinger was bemoaning the idea of losing her beloved son Donald to That Girl, Ann Marie. I wondered then (and I wonder now) how much, if any, truth there was to it. As the mom of two boys, I'm hoping not much. But as the mom of a newly-married daughter, I'm clinging pretty hard to the second part these days. Em and Tuck had been together for nearly eight years when they got married in August, so we were pretty used to them as a couple, but I was aware, if not quite prepared, for the reality that married is different than dating. The first big adjustment came right away--the week of their honeymoon. In the months, weeks, and days leading up to the wedding, I probably talked more with Em than I had since the days she and I were home together before she started school. But when the newlyweds pulled out of our driveway on August 21st, things went from famine to feast in a hurry. Of course, that's exactly as it should be, but that doesn't mean I wasn't feeling the withdrawal. As the week progressed, I knew I had to stick to the rules I set for myself when each of the kids left for college: let them initiate the texting or calling, and even then, keep my replies short. A new school year started for me on the Monday after the wedding, so I kept pretty busy with that and with sorting through the mountain of leftover wedding china and decorations. But keeping busy isn't the same thing as being happy, and I'll admit it was kind of a tough week for Steve and me--we were missing our girl. But we got through its and contact with the honeymooners has long-since been restored: we get texts, calls, and even snapchats pretty regularly. So things have more or less returned to normal. But not exactly. Although, according to the saying, Em will be our daughter all of her life, she's no longer just our daughter, Emily Wendell; she is now Tucker's wife, Emily Krauza. And it's a lot more than just a name change (though even that is going to take some getting used to!). The landscape has been subtly rearranged, the boundaries have shifted. And I need to respect the new lines, to step back a bit. I know that from now on, when some happy thing or some sad thing or really any big thing happens, Tuck will be--and should be--Em's first call, her first listener. And although I thought I'd come to terms with this before, I need to face up to the truth that Em's old room (and Ben's and Darton's) is just that: her old room. She has a new home and a new life with Tucker that is separate from our home and our life. And not only that, she has a new extended family now too. So I need to do what I've been trying to do all along with this blog: loosen my grip on my kids and on the past, as I work through the changes and try, once again, to find my equilibrium in this ever-changing life.

Photo by Nicole Mason

The Morning After

I had a piece of whole wheat toast this morning with a skim coat of peanut butter--my standard breakfast. But yesterday about this time, I was making pumpkin french toast and gingerbread chai lattes for a last salute to the holidays before my daughter headed back to Syracuse. She had been home for two and a half weeks--almost long enough to fool me into believing she was living here again. Her time at home included big events like Christmas Day and New Year's Eve, but just as important, if not more so, were all the little events: watching movies, playing games, lingering at the dinner table, leaving a light on when we go to bed, and seeing her bedroom door closed when we get up in the morning. Those are the things I think about on the morning after when the house is feeling big and empty again. There's no lack of things to keep me busy: I am behind on schoolwork, I need to put away the last of the Christmas decorations, there's laundry to do, snow to shovel, errands to run. But I having trouble attacking my to-do list. The sky is blue, the sun is shining, but I feel dark and heavy inside. Up until this morning, I have been busily pushing away a little nagging thought that this may well have been the last Christmas break that one of my kids was home for the holidays. My oldest  child lives in town, and we see him often, but the only night he slept here over the break was Christmas Eve. My middle child didn't make it home until the day after Christmas this year and was only here for a wonderful but all-too-brief weekend. In between the times my kids are here, I think I'm getting used to the new normal. But then when one or two or, best of all, all three of them are home, I realize anew how much I've been missing them and the days when all five of us were living here. I know those days are gone, and I'm so very lucky I see my kids as often as I do. But it's hard to go back to plain old toast after feasting on pumpkin spice and gingerbread!

Boxes from Home

When I was a kid, I went away to camp several summers in a row. The camp was only about an hour from home (though it seemed much farther), and I only stayed a week (though it seemed much longer). I loved nearly everything about camp, but one of my very favorite parts of being there was the mail call, and my favorite part of the mail call was the day a package arrived from home. It was usually a smallish cardboard box, carefully wrapped and neatly addressed in my mom's tidy handwriting. Inside were treats of all kinds: Cracker Jack, Lifesavers, Chiclets gum, Smarties, Chuckles gumdrops, little bags of peanuts, packages of crackers with peanut butter, and a cheery note. I loved all the fun snacks, of course, but I also liked knowing someone at home was thinking about me when I was off on my own. When my kids went away to college, I remembered what it felt like to get a box from home when you were off on a big adventure. So a couple of times a semester, I tried to send a package: Trick or Treat boxes at Halloween, all-green boxes for St. Patrick's Day, heart-shaped cookies from the town bakery for Valentine's Day, and study-hard-and-finish-strong boxes at the end of every semester. Well, my last child is in her last semester of college, and I recently mailed off the last end-of-the-semester package. Tucked in among the Stacy's Cinnamon Sugar Pita Chips, Pretzel M&M's, Goldfish crackers, Orbit gum, Essie nail polish, and Burt's Bees lip balm were wisps of memories from the last four years, as well as softly shimmering hopes and dreams and good wishes for life after college. I've loved being the mom of college kids, and even though that chapter in our lives is ending, I hope my daughter and both my boys know there will always be someone at home thinking of them when they are off living their own big adventures.

Syracuse Bound?

I haven't written in a while. I got swallowed up by the end of the fall semester and Christmas. Then we spent most of the winter shoveling and trying to keep our pipes from freezing. And as the weeks, then months went by, I started thinking maybe I was done with the blog because maybe I was finally getting used to my emptying nest. But last week I hit a bump in the road. Friday night I was sitting in the darkened high school auditorium watching act one of Bye Bye Birdie. I glanced back and saw my son, the director, standing at the back, keeping watch over the production. Steve was in the seat next to me, and my daughter, Em, was sitting nearby with her boyfriend. She'd arrived home a couple of hours earlier, and as I was fixing dinner, she checked her email and discovered she'd been accepting into the SUITR program at Syracuse University. We cheered and hugged and took big, deep sighs of relief that she'd made it into the program and now had a good option for life after graduation, then we headed off to see the musical. I think I was watching the scene where fifteen-year-old Kim McAfee starts calling her parents by their first names and her mom is wishing her daughter wasn't growing up quite so fast, when all of a sudden it hit me: if Em goes to Syracuse, she has to be on campus by June 2. This means for the first time ever, we will have no kids at home for the summer. I whispered this to Steve and saw in an instant the thought hadn't yet occurred to him either. He squeezed my hand and we turned our attention back to the show. But later that night after we got home, we tried to come to terms with how we were feeling. Were we happy for her? Absolutely. Proud? You bet. Yet were we sad for ourselves? You better believe it. Suddenly, the summer started stretching out looking long, hot, and lonely. The Syracuse shadow has loomed over me all week.  But then I started thinking about Bye Bye Birdie. One of the main characters in the show is 33-year-old Albert Peterson. Part of the plot revolves around him trying to break the news to his overbearing mother (Mae Peterson) that he is going to dissolve the family business and marry his secretary Rose Alvarez. Deep in the second act when Albert finally gets up the courage to tell his mother, once and for all, she says, "So it's come at last. At last it's come. The day I knew would come at last has come, at last. My sonny-boy doesn't need me anymore." Now there's a part of me that can definitely relate to and sympathize with Mae, but I know I don't want to be Mae. I would never want to get in the way of my kids' futures. So if Em heads off to Syracuse at the beginning of June, we will cheer her on and move her in and hug her hard. Then we will come back to our empty house and muddle through the long, hot summer as best we can, reminding ourselves that July will be easier than June and next summer will be easier than this summer. And maybe one day soon, this blog can find a new direction!

Birthdays

"This is how it is with your children, she thought. You hold all the versions of them there ever were simultaneously in your heart." --Sue Miller

The weekend before last, all three of our kids were home. The two from out of town arrived by surprise  Friday night. They had come to help us celebrate our birthdays. The surprise visit involved a lot of planning and texting (and lying), but they pulled it off. We were completely unsuspecting and thoroughly surprised. It was the perfect present: we laughed and talked and ate and played games. And what Sue Miller's character says in the above quote was so true. As we sat around the table at the restaurant or in the dining room playing cards, I'd watch these grown-up kids of mine signing credit card slips, giving advice about grad school and teaching, and sharing plans for the end-of-student-teaching gifts, and I would also see an eight-year-old perched on a counter stool making an elaborate cardboard-paper-glitter present, a seven-year-old playing school with his brother and all the stuffed animals, and a six-year-old saving money in a little safe in the corner of his bedroom. It happens all the time--you see a twinkle in an eye, a stubborn look on a face, a familiar habit or gesture, and in that instant, the past telescopes itself and you see all the versions of themselves your children have ever been. Today at 4:33, my oldest child will turn twenty-seven years old, and for the first time, my parenting years will outnumber my non-parenting years. For me, birthdays have always been a time for looking back, for remembering each age and stage, but lately they have also become a time for looking ahead, for imagining all the versions of my kids that are yet to be.

Happy Birthday, Ben!

Signs of Fall

Signs of fall are all around. It's moving-in weekend for SUNY Fredonia students, and the Fredonia Farm Festival is in full swing. Quiet summer nights have given way to the loud voices and late-night laughter of our new student-neighbors as they make their way home from house parties and bars. On my way to the farmers' market early this morning, I saw the tell-tale beer cans nestled in the grass and the first few colored leaves on the sidewalk. Although fall is my favorite season, these early signs of fall are bittersweet. If fall is coming, that means summer is ending. And the end of summer means our last child will be leaving for her last year of college. It means the house will soon feel too big, too quiet, and too empty. It means taking baby spinach and baby kale for green smoothies off my weekly shopping list and adding non-vegetarian entrees to our weekly menus. It means my girl won't be perched on the other couch doing her nails or making bracelets while we watch Mad About You or Gilmore Girls. It means I won't see her ponytail swinging as she heads out for a run. It means she won't be making us laugh at the dinner table or on the tennis court. It means we have to get used to being two again, instead of three or four or five. We've been sending kids off to college for nine years now, but somehow it never gets any easier. How can it? How can we stop missing our kids when they are not with us? My mom is eighty-one, and she still misses my sister, my brothers and me.  She treasures letters, phone calls, and visits and wishes they were all more frequent.  So maybe it's something you never really make peace with, you just handle it as gracefully as possible and keep your door and heart open.  For everything there is a season.

Cape May

The first time we went to Cape May our kids were six, four, and one. One-year-old Emily spent most of the week asleep in her little umbrella stroller, but the rest of us fell in love with the Victorian houses and the little shops, with Sunset Beach and Bodacious Bagels, and especially with the sun, the sand, and the ocean! We returned the next summer, and then four more times over the next twelve years. We always went with some (or all) of my family--sometimes renting a house together and sometimes getting adjoining motel rooms. Some of our fondest memories are from those Cape May vacations--despite years when it was cold and rainy or when the water was too full of jellyfish to swim or when half the group had the stomach flu. To me there's something almost magical about a beach vacation, and I've been missing the ocean. After a seven-year dry spell, we are headed back to Cape May. Before long we'll be packing all three kids (now twenty-six, twenty-four, and twenty-one) and all our beach gear into our good old minivan to make the long drive to the Jersey shore. When we get there, we'll be cosily sharing one hotel room--tightly equipped with two double beds, a sofa bed, and a cot, so we're hoping hard for good weather and cheerful moods! I know things will be different than they used to be: Bodacious Bagels is no longer in business; my kids won't have their cousins to hang out with; Steve and I won't have my siblings and their spouses to laugh and talk and walk with; my mom won't be whizzing by on her bicycle. But I still can't wait to get there. I can't wait to see the mighty Atlantic Ocean and the brightly colored houses of Cape May again; I can't wait to take early morning walks on the quiet beach and spend afternoons reading in the sun. But what I'm looking forward to more than anything is having our little family together again for a few blissful, uninterrupted days.

Mother's Day

"Anything, any loss of sleep, any loss of ease, was worth the sweet, and too, too brief time of holding little ones until they burst out of your arms and into the world." --Rafael Yglesias in Only Children

Last year on Mother's Day, I wrote a post honoring my mom; this year I want to honor my kids. As any parent will attest, having children changes you forever. But what I've been realizing lately is that having kids keeps changing you. Like most children, I learned a lot from my parents as I was growing up; much of who I am was shaped by who they were.  It wasn't until I had kids of my own that I realized the current runs both ways--children shape parents just as much as parents shape children.  When our kids are young, we teach them how the world works.  We share our favorite foods, places, and hobbies with them.  We try our best to help them develop good manners, strong faith, and healthy habits. But then, somewhere around the time our kids hit middle school, the balance shifts and we start learning from them.  As their worlds expand, so does ours. They start to share their favorite music and movies with us; we follow their team buses to places we've never been before; we learn about backpacking, guild auditions, and cross-country running. When they get to high school, our kids bring the world to us--they show us pictures and tell us stories of their trips to France, Italy, Greece, Puerto Rico, and Australia.  They help us see and feel and understand things we never even imagined.  Then they go off to college, and they begin to live the lives we tried to prepare them for as they were growing up in our homes. When they come home on breaks, we are surprised by the changes: the new maturity, outlooks, attitudes. In some ways, they are the children they've always been, but in other ways, they are young adults who feel more like friends.  All of a sudden we realize they are showing us how the world works (especially the world of technology!). We admire and learn from their generosity, their fearlessness, their stamina and self-discipline. They remind us that it's important to have fun, to take risks, and to dream big.  On this Mother's Day weekend, I want to thank my kids--not just for all the breakfasts in bed and Mother's Day gifts over the years, but for the many ways they've changed me, and for all the things I continue to learn from them.

"I would like them to be the happy end of my story."
--Margaret Atwood

Growing Up

Seventeen years ago we were in Florida for spring break, and our youngest child was about to turn four.  But instead of getting ready for a sunny Florida birthday, we found ourselves in the midst of an emotional storm. The problem? Em didn't want to celebrate her birthday. She didn't want a cake, she didn't want presents, and most of all, she didn't want to be four.  One of the books she liked at the time was I Like to Be Little by Charlotte Zolotow, which begins,

"Once there was a little girl.
"What do you want to be when you grow up? her mother asked.
"I just want to stay little right now," she said.
"Why?" said her mother. "It's nice to be grown up. Why do you want to be little?"
"Because I am," said the little girl, "and because when you are little you can do things you can't when you grow up."

In the rest of the book the little girl describes things she can do because she's little that grown-ups don't do (skipping when she's glad, making a house under the dining room table, going barefoot in summertime, eating snow when it first falls). Em had taken all that to heart and had decided she didn't want to get any older.  Another one of her favorite books at the time was The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister, and what finally calmed the storm and eased Em through the transition from three to four was the promise of a rainbow fish birthday cake. Before long she discovered being older meant she could do more tricks on the playground and keep up better with her brothers, and she sailed through the rest of being four, and five, and six . . . and really all the way through being nineteen. Last year around this time, there were echoes of that long ago birthday. Whenever I started to mention her upcoming birthday, she stopped me and said, "I don't want to talk about it."  Once again she was struggling with getting older; she wasn't one bit excited about turning twenty and leaving her teen years behind.  There were no tears or tantrums this time, but there was a bit of sadness in her eyes as her birthday approached.  So now here we are on the eve of her twenty-first birthday; tomorrow my daughter will officially be an adult, a grown-up. I don't really know how she's feeling about it; she's been through a tough week, so her mind has been on other things. But I've been watching her over the past year, and I can see that she's ready. What the little girl in the book didn't yet know is that there are a lot of great things waiting for you when you grow up that you can't do when you're little. And I think that even though Em liked being little, she's going to love being grown up.  Happy 21st birthday, Em!

Kindergarten Blankets

One of the items on the supply list for kindergarten for each of my kids was "nap mat."  In one of the many conversations a good friend and I had about kindergarten the summer before our first-borns headed off to school, she mentioned that she was going to make her son a thick blanket-like nap mat, using fabric from Jo-Ann's and fluffy polyester batting.  I loved this idea and decided to use Ben's bandanas to make his nap mat.  I did the same thing for my other two children, choosing brightly colored dolphin fabric for my science- and nature-loving middle child and for my youngest, cheerful cotton fabric that featured cute little faces of kids, many of whom had blonde curly hair just like Em's.  In the fourteen years since my youngest finished kindergarten, the blankets have been folded and stacked in the corner of our piano room.  Our house is big and old and drafty, and the kindergarten blankets became couch blankets for watching TV and floor blankets for our old dog who loved a bit of extra warmth and comfort.  Ben's bandana blanket has grown frail with age, so I've tucked it away for safe keeping, but we still use the other two, all these years later.  And every time I pull one out, I think back to those kindergarten days and what a leap of faith it was to send my children out into the world for the first time.  I hoped that when they unrolled their nap mats on days they were feeling sad or tired, they'd be cheered, warmed, and comforted.  I hoped in some subtle way, they would be reminded there was someone at home who loved them and was waiting for them to return at the end of the day.  And now that my children are grown and out in a much bigger world, it's an even bigger leap of faith to let go and watch them live their lives.  They no longer have time to nap or soft little blankets to stretch out on, but still I hope on days they are feeling sad or sick or worried, they know there is someone at home who loves them and is always waiting for the next time they come home.  

Withdrawal

". . . nothing made him happier, nothing made him feel safer and more at ease with the world, than having one of his children under his roof once again."  (from The Arrivals by Meg Mitchell Moore)

I've been feeling a bit glum this week.  At first I chalked it up to the February blues, but honestly, I don't really mind winter all that much, except for the shoveling, which hasn't been too bad this year.  There's nothing really amiss in my little world:  My semester is off to a good start, the kids are doing well, and Steve is enjoying a much-needed February break.  So why was I feeling a little out of sorts, a little off my game?  Slowly, it dawned on me--I'm in withdrawal.  My youngest was home for the weekend and now she's back at school.  And I miss her.  I miss her car in the driveway, her face at the dinner table, and her body asleep in her bed upstairs.  I miss the way her sweet, funny presence lights up the house.  I also miss the way I feel when she is home.  Meg Mitchell Moore describes it perfectly in the quote above--when one of my kids is home, I feel "happier, safer, and more at ease with the world."  So even though I'm slowly getting used to this new stage in my life, the transition after a visit is rough.  And I suspect it always will be.

October

"I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers."  --Anne of Green Gables

Early October with its extra-banket nights and still-warm golden days is one of my favorite times of year.  The sky is an impossible blue.  Treetops, backyards, and sidewalks are covered with rich red, cheerful orange, and sunlit yellow leaves.  Apples are crunchy, cider is sweet, and pumpkin spice flavors are everywhere.  Although it's sad to put away shorts and sandals, it's fun to start wearing sweaters and boots again.  The furnace rumbles on from time to time, but there's no snow in the forecast yet (at least not usually!).  But when I woke up this morning, on the first of October, I wasn't thinking about any of these things. Instead, I was feeling sad that Em's weekend visit was over, I was feeling stressed about all the schoolwork ahead of me, and I was feeling worried about Steve's radiation treatments starting at the end of the week.  Although I would like to have pulled the blankets back over my head and gone back to sleep, I got up and got myself ready, and out into the world I went.  And that's when October started to work its magic.  The bright leaves, warm sun, and blue sky banded together and reminded me to look up, not down; to see the good, not the bad; and to be thankful for kids who come home for the weekend, for a job I love, for the technology that exists to make my husband well, and yes, for Octobers.

Messy vs. Neat

My second- and third-born children are at opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to keeping their rooms neat, and I've often wondered why--they share the same gene pool, they grew up in the same environment, and yet they are nothing alike in this particular area.  No matter how many times I asked my son to clean his room or pitched in and cleaned it myself, it just didn't stay clean.  By the time he was in as in high school, I gave up hounding him about it.  Occasionally, he took it upon himself to clean things up, but most of the time, you could barely see the floor--it was covered with piles of dirty clothes, stacks of clean clothes, books, sneakers, candy wrappers, and school papers.  I think he actually liked the way his room looked and felt when it was clean, but it didn't matter enough to him to keep it that way since the mess didn't really bother him.   In contrast, my daughter's room is a model of organization.  She makes her bed every morning, her dresser drawers hold neat stacks of clothes, her closet is organized by color, her bookshelves are carefully arranged and maintained.  When she comes home from a trip, she unpacks immediately and puts everything away.  She can't understand why anyone wouldn't do this or how a person could take off clothes and leave them on the floor instead of putting them away.  Thinking about this difference between two of my kids made me realize something.  As our kids grow up and leave home, it's easy for us parents to blame ourselves when one of them is in distress.  We're quick to worry that maybe we didn't do enough as parents or maybe we did too much.  Even when it's not quite rational, we fall into the trap of thinking that if we'd just been better parents, our children wouldn't be suffering.  But if I think just about Darton's room vs. Em's room, I can easily see that it wasn't anything I did or didn't do as a parent that made one of them messy and the other neat--it's just the way they are. So maybe instead of getting caught up in blaming ourselves, the best thing we parents can do is to help our kids through the hard times they will inevitably face as adults, whether this means helping them clean up a mess to find something they've lost, encouraging them to relax and take things in stride, or simply reminding them how very much they are loved.

It's Just Broccoli

My youngest moved out of the dorm and into a college-owned townhouse at the beginning of this school year, and as a result has been eating in the dining hall less and cooking more.  I finally finished copying the recipes for her red binder (Recipes), so she has that with her.  But there are a lot of little things that aren't in there.  Sunday afternoon we were talking on the phone, and she asked how long you could keep broccoli in the fridge and how much she should cook for one person--she was worried she was eating too many carbs and not enough veggies.  After our conversation, she headed off to the little local grocery store in search of broccoli.  Around dinner time, I got a text saying, "so to cook broccoli, do you just put it in a pot of water?"  I texted back a few instructions, and she replied, "okay thanks hope i can make it like you."  I smiled to myself thinking, It's just broccoli.  A little while later I got back-to-back texts; the first one said, "it's good!" and then came the one that has stayed with me all week: "tasted like home :) ."  I came to realize that it wasn't "just broccoli"; it was my college-age daughter taking care of herself, eating her veggies, and carrying forward into her life-away-from-home something I never even realized I was passing along.  Broccoli is the one vegetable everybody in our family likes; I can't imagine how many florets I've cut and cooked over the years.  But to me, it was always just something to go along with the meal, something I fixed almost without thinking about it.  I never thought about it "tasting like home."  And maybe that's a good lesson for those of us in the process of letting go of our kids--they're going to be just fine; they have picked up and taken with them all the things they want and need most.

Here We Go Again

The real packing hasn't begun in earnest yet, but the pile of stuff in the piano room is starting to grow as it does every year around this time.  I'm not sure that sending a child off to college at the end of the summer is any easier now than it was seven years ago when we did it for the first time, but I guess I've finally gotten somewhat used to it.  This doesn't stop me from feeling sad each time I pass through the piano room and see textbooks and dishes and laundry detergent waiting to be loaded into the van.  It also doesn't eliminate the tension I feel between yearning to hold on and needing to let go.  And, of course, I'm well aware of how empty and quiet the house is going to feel Thursday night.  But watching my children go and come back repeatedly over the past several years has built up a kind of resilience in me that I didn't feel when this whole process started.  With our youngest child heading into her junior year, we are nearing the end of the path we started seven years ago, and I suspect I am going to need every bit of that resilience as we face the next step: life after the college years.

We Love Lucy

My son Ben's fascination with classic TV reaches way to his childhood.  One of the happiest days of his young life was when we finally got cable TV, and he could watch Nick at Night.  He gobbled up  biographies, autobiographies, and other TV books by and about sitcom legends like Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore, Bob Newhart, and especially Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.  Every Christmas and birthday included requests for VHS tapes or DVDs of classic sitcom episodes and seasons.  I think it all started with I Love Lucy.  He and I used to watch the show together occasionally when he was quite young, and he's been a big Lucy fan ever since.  He knows all about Desi's use of the three-camera technique in filming I Love Lucy, which made the rerun possible.  He knows the details of Lucy and Desi's stormy relationship, as well as all kinds of trivia about the Ricardos and Mertzes--in fact, if you give him an episode number he can tell you the title of the I Love Lucy episode.  When it was a lot more expensive than it is now, he bought the entire I Love Lucy series on DVD.  We all watch Ben's Lucy DVDs, and every time there's an I Love Lucy marathon on TV, we tune in.  We have favorite lines and episodes that we never tire of hearing and seeing.  My daughter Em is almost as big a Lucy fan as Ben is, so Saturday night, at her suggestion, we drove to Jamestown for the Lucy Fest.  The museum was closed when we got there, but we had fun walking around town listening to "Cuban Pete" and other signature Desi Arnaz/Ricky Ricardo songs being broadcast on loudspeakers and watching two I Love Lucy episodes being shown under the stars with other Lucy fans.  Happy 101st birthday, Lucy--thanks for all the laughter and good memories!

Running in the Dark

When my daughter was in high school, she ran cross-country.  During the most intense part of their season, she used to do two-a-day practices, one after school with the team and the other in the early mornings before school.  The problem with the early morning practices was that it was still dark when she went out to run.  Now I wish I could say I laced up my own sneakers and ran with her, but I'm more of a walker than a runner--I could never have kept up with her.  So instead, I trailed her in the car.  She usually took the same route on those early morning runs, so I'd give her a short head start, then I'd follow along behind her with my headlights beaming a path for her.  If I started holding up traffic, I'd pull ahead and watch for her to come running along, ponytail swinging.  She's a college basketball player now, and along with ball-handling, shooting drills, weight-lifting, and rope-jumping, her summer training includes running.  She tries to get some of her workout done before she goes to work in the morning, then does the rest in the evening.  A couple of nights ago, she didn't have a chance to run until about 9:30, and as she was getting ready to go, we realized it was already dark.  So she took her old early-morning route, and I trailed her in the car, just like the old days.  Maybe it's the English teacher in me, but driving alongside my running daughter--offering light and company and protection--seems like an apt metaphor for the kind of parent I want to be throughout my kids' lives.  I can't do her running for her or even with her, but when she's running in the dark, sometimes I can make things a little bit safer and easier.