The beginning of the end

 “People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child -- our own two eyes. All is a miracle.”- Thich Nhat Hanh

And in the blink of an eye, it’s gone.

I was lying on the sterile blue examination table in my OB/GYN’s office the other day.  Flat on my back, looking for patterns in the small holes of the ceiling tiles overhead.  “Senior year,” she said as she did her thing, “Senior year is hard.  Really hard.”  Often, it’s in those odd moments when we are most vulnerable, when we least expect it, that true wisdom resides.  She peaked up at me, and gave me one of those all knowing looks.  Her daughter is in college already, heading into her second year at a tiny university in Minnesota.  “It took me all of her first semester away before I could pass her bedroom without crying.”

Great.

17 and a half years ago I was lying in this same room, flat on my back, talking to this same, very wise woman who had already been through it. Already done what I was about to do.  She was sharing her experience, the wisdom of someone who knew what was coming.  I was excited and nervous and full of questions and she answered every one, not like a doctor with clinical answers that came from years in medical school and delivered with professional distance.  No, these were the words of a fellow mother, shared from the heart and they gave me comfort.

17 and a half years ago, he was still a dream.  A big basketball sized bump in my midsection with a strong heartbeat and propensity for shoving his heels into my ribs.  It doesn’t seem that long ago.

Today he began his last year in high school.  The clock is officially ticking.

We had a fight last night.  Another one of those fights we seem to have so often these days.  "It’s his tone," I tell him.  “I don’t like your tone.  How dare you speak to me like that?  Just who do you think you’re talking to?”

I’ve been too lenient, I think to myself.  “If I spoke to my parents the way you talk to me and Dad,” I repeat time and time again, “ I would be dead.  Grandpa would have killed me.”  It’s just the slightest bit of an exaggeration, but not much.  We didn’t dare say the things our kids manage to say to us.  We thought them.  We just didn’t say them out loud.

He’s pushing away.

And so we fought.  And I hated it.  I hate every single one of them, but this one was worse because right smack in the middle of it, I heard it, the ticking of the clock.  I don’t want to spend the last year of his time living in this house with his heels firmly planted in my ribs.  Some things never change.

It’s starting.  The grieving process, I mean. 

He’s growing.  Faster and faster it seems.  I hated the beard that he grew this summer, just because he could.  Hated that he looked older.  Hated that his friends liked it.  That his girl “friends” liked it.  Hated that it made him look like a man.

I don’t want him to grow up.   

My friend Judy is about to send her last child off to college.  “I can’t imagine,” I say.  “It’s going to be so hard,” I confess, as the tears begin to well up in my tired eyes. 

She’s excited, she tells me.  No more worrying about homework.  No more late nights wondering where he is and when he’s coming home.  “I’m not a mother anymore,” she says aloud, as if trying on a new identity.

“I can’t imagine.” I say again, because I really can’t.  It’s all I know anymore and I tell her what my OB/GYN had told me just a few days before.

It’s going to be a long year. 

And I’m determined to savor every minute.

Comments

[Elisa]

You are right... we would have been "killed" had we used the words we truly wanted to say. Open a different door! Instead of "meeting" him head on, find another route to get at the root of the problem! Enjoy his last year of HS! I have faith in you... you can do it!

[Lesley]

Who is that man in the picture? You could at least posted a picture of Tucker.....!!!

[Frances]

Not the beginning of the end, Suz, it's the end of the beginning!

[Cory]

That last year is pretty tough but in the end it is all worth it knowing that you created the man he was becoming.