The Changing of Seasons
A few weeks ago, Matt and I drove twelve hours, dropped our 18 year old son off, then drove twelve hours home. I turned to Matt as we drove away and said, “is it normal and okay to leave your child this far from home and just drive away?”
I’ve experienced lots of emotions and had many thoughts these last few weeks. Before the trip to Oklahoma City and since. I’ve wondered if my feelings are normal or if there’s something a little off in the way I process things. I’ve wondered if my actions and behaviors have affected the way Will feels about where he is now or if he wonders how I feel about him. There’s mom guilt. There’s relief. There’s sadness. There’s pride. There’s excitement.
As I’ve processed all of these things, I’ve wondered if I’m really sad, and if so, why? Where are the emotions coming from? Why aren’t there more tears? Do tears equate to a certain amount of love? Should I be more upset that he’s so far away? I’ve made the choice not to feel guilty about when I’m emotional and when I’m not. That is not a measurement of my love for or feelings about someone or something.
A good friend of mine called me yesterday in tears. She had a moment with her oldest son where she was overwhelmed by the thought that he didn’t need her anymore. My response was not necessarily what she expected. I told her that was good. She has raised him to be independent and she has done her job well. Sometimes we just need a reminder of what the goal of parenting really is.
Will’s last Sunday at our home church, he played drums with his Dad and our Worship Team. Our pastor and friend, VP, honored him beautifully and the entire church cheered for him, cried over him and prayed over him. The pride I felt for him and the love I felt for him from our church family was overwhelming. I cried lots of tears that morning. They weren’t sad tears. They were thankful tears. They were proud tears. They were genuine tears… an honest expression from my heart toward people I love.
As we left the next day, there was excitement. Excitement for what was ahead. I received many texts throughout the week asking how I was doing and confirming what I already knew… many people were praying for him and for us. There was an entire community of people cheering for him. Proud tears. Thankful tears.
There was a point along the trip to Oklahoma that I was driving in the van by myself, listening to random songs on the radio. Matt and Will were in his car behind me. I had been feeling strong so far, but it wasn’t long until I heard the words “it won’t be this way for long” on the radio. Out of nowhere, the tears came. I wasn’t expecting them and I wasn’t prepared for them. I thought back to the days when Will was so little - riding his bike to school with Matt in Kindergarten - playing violin on our front steps in Florida, hoping to get tips from the neighbors - swimming his little heart out in our neighborhood pool - swinging WAY too high on the swing in our backyard - sucking his thumb and rubbing his Taggie blanket to fall asleep.. Those are the moments that incited the emotions. But again, was that sadness? I thought a lot about why these memories brought tears. Do I want to go back to those moments? No. Am I sad they happened? Absolutely not. Do I want Will to be little again? I sometimes believe this to be true, but in reality, no. I don’t want Will to be little again. Seasons change and we mourn the past, but would we want it any other way? If anything, it makes me want to absorb every moment I have with our two boys still at home.
Matt and I have worked hard to raise Will to be who he is today, along with other great examples he’s had in his life. Yes, there are things we wish we had done differently, but we raised him to be independent and move forward when the time came. We taught him how to dress himself and brush his teeth. How to cook for himself and do his laundry. The importance of deodorant and flushing the toilet. How to drive and how to go through a job interview. How to read The Word and talk to his Heavenly Father. How to serve the Church with his gifts. If he didn’t move on to this next season in his life, did we really succeed in our job as parents?
Occasionally Will will answer a FaceTime call from his mom & dad. It’s so good to see his face and hear his voice and know that he’s thriving. Because he was homeschooled since he was in second grade, college is a whole lot of new. Being in classes with peers. Constantly being with a whole lot of people his age. Eating in a cafeteria. Having teachers that aren’t your mom - however, his cousin is his Bible professor. :) Plus, living twelve hours away inevitably means being independent on a whole new level. In spite of all of this new, he’s killing it. If he weren’t, my perspective would look a lot different, I’m sure.
Raising kids is hard. By hard I don’t mean bad. It is a beautifully chaotic undertaking. It’s messy - literally and figuratively. It’s full of joy and celebration. It’s sprinkled with anxiety and fear. There’s pride and pure delight. It has touches of anger and disappointment - in our kids and in ourselves. But it’s so good. To see your child take a huge step of pure faith and commit to move 12 hours away to follow God’s lead is good. It’s so amazingly good.
This mama’s heart skips a little when a text is received unprompted from him. It usually contains pictures of clothes or shoes, asking for mine and Matt’s advice. It’s good to know we are still needed and our advice is still important to him. I hope that never changes, even when my response to the text is “You need to get a job before buying shoes.” His counter-text was “I sold a knife I’m not allowed to carry at school for $135 because I need tennis shoes.” This kid’s going to do just fine.
