There’s no point counting down anymore. The time has come to
let go the apron strings, loosen the heart strings, and watch Our Daughter and her best buddie roommate recede
in the rearview mirror as we drive away from her college
dorm.
Not long ago, or so it seems, she cried at the thought of
leaving home for college. She practically made us promise never to send her
away.
Sure, she was a kindergartener at the time, but what has
that got to do with anything? Just because she has managed to maturely accept
the concept of living on her own and is eagerly looking forward to the sundry,
looming freedoms awaiting her doesn’t mean I can’t hyperventilate every now and
then.
Or openly weep.
In public.
While picking out strawberries at Walmart.
Somewhere along the way, and without any regard for my
wishes, she changed from a happy, if slightly insecure, little girl to a
confident young woman. Play dates have been replaced by plans to meet up with
friends. Preschool in Pinehurst has given way to Pre-Dental studies at UNCG. I
don’t recall ever giving permission for any of this to happen.
This is the same kid who once blew out a diaper so badly we
spent thirty minutes washing poop out of her hair. She’s the same girl who ate
so many fish crackers she ended up projectile vomiting all over her mother and
the surrounding fifteen square feet of shag carpet. This is the girl who spent
the better part of nine years learning how to ride a bicycle. She’s the one who
got on the bus for the band trip to Disney without remembering to pack her
instrument, and we’re going to trust her to manage her time wisely and, at
some point in the not-too-distant future, drill holes in people’s teeth?
And, yet, it is happening, regardless of all my concerns,
fears, trepidations and unwillingness to see her as anything but that cute
little bundle with the puffy cheeks and tremendous brown eyes we brought home
from the hospital nearly eighteen years ago.
Her bedroom has been raked over in search of treasures to either
bring with her or pack away, and to make way for her twin brothers to finally
have their own rooms. There’s a large pile of stuff in the basement – linens
and clothing, textbooks and small appliances – waiting to be packed in the van
tomorrow night in preparation for the journey to their
new home in Greensboro. And there’s the girl herself, in limbo, struggling with
short-timer’s disease, eager to gleefully leap into her studies with familiar wide-eyed
enthusiasm, waiting for the next exciting phase of her life to begin.
In a few months, possibly even just a few weeks, it will all
become the new normal. We will eventually stop calling it her bedroom. We will
adjust to dinners at the smaller table in the kitchen nook instead of the big
table in the dining room. The dog will stop searching the house for her and we
will accept the fact she is capable of moving on without us into the life for
which, if we have been even a faint semblance of the perfect parents we like to
think we are, we have prepared her. She will be fine, and so will we.
However, you might want to avoid the strawberries at Walmart
for a little while. They might be a bit salty.
2015 Mark Feggeler
