I haven’t written in awhile. A long while. I keep paying for this humble, immature site ~ my pen bone dry.
It’s complicated when your children get older. Their stories are not your stories to tell, and the lines between what to write and what to save as sacred get tangled. It can be hard to show up full of half stories. I’m muddling through this new era of motherhood and dipping my toes in the water of writing about it.
Tonight Tall Kid stopped over. My oldest. My firstborn. The boy who towers over me, his five-foot-four mother, all six-plus feet of him. My boy, who got married this spring and now it’s October and he hasn’t lived here within these walls for five solid months. And I did it again – I cried a lonely cry in the bathroom when he left. I don’t know why I can’t stop with that crying routine; it happens EVERY time he leaves…even five months in. It’s rather embarassing to be honest. No one wants a crying mother, not even the mother who is blubbering over with tears – hoping desperately that the rest of the family will not notice the puffy eyes and snot boogers when the door unlocks.
He stopped over to pick up a package that had mistakenly arrived at his “old” address (our house). I noticed that he is growing a beard: a nice, neatly trimmed beard to fit his nice, suit-clad skinny frame, fresh from work. He’s always been this same boy. He has gotten taller and has moved out and is married now, but he is still the boy who I lovingly raised all those years. He has unwaveringly been the same soul since the very first day I held him. It’s a weird thing for mothers… we notice how our boy’s appearance has changed but we also notice that they haven’t changed a wink since birth.
He went to the kitchen to talk to his dad, and I just sat in the living room loving the sound of his voice. It was as if the walls sighed, grateful to have his voice within once again-like the house was suddenly whole. And also the emptiness of the house was louder. Because of the temporal nature of that voice, the knowledge that it would be exiting again soon… the deafening void that would once again fall.
I am so happy for him. For his new life with his new wife, his career success, his new car, his wonderful apartment that I don’t have to clean. I am overjoyed at his happiness. I would never wish him back here just to pacify something lost within my own soul. My heart rejoices for him.
But I mourn for me. For the end of an era. For how quickly it went.
As he is talking to his dad and I am basking in his voice, I remember how GOOD it felt to have all of my babies under one roof. It floats back to me, this feeling of contentment and joy over the presence of them all – every head here, safe, tucked in. And I shockingly realize this feeling to be a long-lost friend that I forgot existed. I hadn’t felt this feeling in months. And I am also aware in the moment that I am not really feeling it here and now- I am only seeing its ghost. In blatant honesty, it’s a feeling that left when my son left and it will never return. Because there will always be someone missing, from this point forward. Our people have expanded to new zip codes and addresses, and this is only the beginning of the exodus.
Yes, I sat there on that couch, listening to him … the memory of the good old days falling around me and transporting me back… suddenly the old wild rumpus of a young trio of boys was bouncing through my mind gleefully. Just as swiftly came a sudden and rudely sharp stab: there will be no more family movie nights of old. I cannot waltz into the kitchen and ask him if he’s up for a movie night and what kind of candy he’d like – because he is headed… home. Somewhere else. I cannot spontaneously enjoy a movie night with him on a Monday. Those days have passed. And that guts me. My mind stood there, laying flowers on the gravestone of What Has Been.
I wish I was a strong woman who didn’t let these things burn. Perhaps I wish I lived more surface level emotionally and didn’t deep think and explore the caverns within. Alas. I am me. And I am telling it like it is.
He is a good boy. He is my boy. Just as I spent eighteen years raising him to successfully live without me, I will spend eternity doing my best to never come between him and all God has for him out there in the big wide world. This is motherhood. It’s the selfish desire to never let go and keep everything the same, and the selfless love that prevents that selfishness from ever showing up.
I hugged him goodbye. And I beelined for the bathroom. This is my way. This is where I’m at, five months living in this new parenting zip code.
Let me leave this with a laugh sprouting from my pen. When I was pregnant with Tall Kid, I lovingly designed his entire nursery – every detail carefully thought out. In his first week of life, I was changing him on his perfectly picked changing table, and as I lifted up his legs he let out a toot that shot newborn poo all over his pristine, white curtains. I gasped in shock. And then I looked down at his innocent little face and laughed hysterically. That moment defined motherhood for me. It’s this perfect calling, full of promise and wonder – and also it’s the daily grind of dirt and poo and hard things… and it all exists simultaneously.
We cannot have the deep closeness without the wrenching letting go-ness.
Wherever you are tonight, Tall Kid: goodnight. I love you.
Saltbox Colonial 