way, headed for Seattle as I waved and waved to them, tears streaming down my face, their car smaller and smaller until it turned onto the highway and I couldn't see it at all. Oh my goodness, how I miss them so! This is what I have wanted for them since the day they were born: happiness, love, success, adventure, fulfillment...but I didn't realize the sacrifice it meant for me; that for them to fly, I would have to let go of them. I didn't know how much the letting go would hurt. I didn't know how hard it would be to keep from calling out, "Wait, don't leave me behind!" Selfishly, I wish I could go back and change the things I said or did to encourage them to be independent. Why did I have to push them so, and expect so much of them? Why was it so important to me that they reach for the stars? Why couldn't I let them settle for what was here and safe and close at hand? Thinking that, I am all too aware that it is entirely possible that nothing I said or did to sway them or otherwise damage them would have any effect on their choices in life; that it is possible, even probable, that they would have become the fabulous people they are in spite of my fumbling mothering. Just the same, I wish it had been different; that time had moved more slowly, that I had been less busy, and less worried; that I could have savoured it more, or remembered it well. I once had a friend, long ago when Kerrie was in preschool, who told me about the day her daughter was born. Her own mother came into the hospital room soon after the birth and asked, "What do you have, a son or a daughter?" "A daughter!" she was beaming, but her mother began to cry. When she asked what the tears were for, her mother told her, "Your heart will break a thousand times." I think of that story often, whenever my heart is breaking.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Goodbye Christmas
Christmas has come and gone, and with it my beautiful girls. I anticipated this Christmas with such excitement, I wanted to slow its coming, in order to slow its departing. All my girls were with me for Christmas, and we all knew that it may be the last time. But Christmas rushed in so fast, as it does, and rushed out again. Whitney left two days ago, flying to San Diego on her way to her new life in New Orleans. I didn't think my heart would ever stop breaking; it took everything in me to let go of her and watch her walk out the door. And now Kerrie and her family, Jamey and Karsen, have gone down the drive
way, headed for Seattle as I waved and waved to them, tears streaming down my face, their car smaller and smaller until it turned onto the highway and I couldn't see it at all. Oh my goodness, how I miss them so! This is what I have wanted for them since the day they were born: happiness, love, success, adventure, fulfillment...but I didn't realize the sacrifice it meant for me; that for them to fly, I would have to let go of them. I didn't know how much the letting go would hurt. I didn't know how hard it would be to keep from calling out, "Wait, don't leave me behind!" Selfishly, I wish I could go back and change the things I said or did to encourage them to be independent. Why did I have to push them so, and expect so much of them? Why was it so important to me that they reach for the stars? Why couldn't I let them settle for what was here and safe and close at hand? Thinking that, I am all too aware that it is entirely possible that nothing I said or did to sway them or otherwise damage them would have any effect on their choices in life; that it is possible, even probable, that they would have become the fabulous people they are in spite of my fumbling mothering. Just the same, I wish it had been different; that time had moved more slowly, that I had been less busy, and less worried; that I could have savoured it more, or remembered it well. I once had a friend, long ago when Kerrie was in preschool, who told me about the day her daughter was born. Her own mother came into the hospital room soon after the birth and asked, "What do you have, a son or a daughter?" "A daughter!" she was beaming, but her mother began to cry. When she asked what the tears were for, her mother told her, "Your heart will break a thousand times." I think of that story often, whenever my heart is breaking.
way, headed for Seattle as I waved and waved to them, tears streaming down my face, their car smaller and smaller until it turned onto the highway and I couldn't see it at all. Oh my goodness, how I miss them so! This is what I have wanted for them since the day they were born: happiness, love, success, adventure, fulfillment...but I didn't realize the sacrifice it meant for me; that for them to fly, I would have to let go of them. I didn't know how much the letting go would hurt. I didn't know how hard it would be to keep from calling out, "Wait, don't leave me behind!" Selfishly, I wish I could go back and change the things I said or did to encourage them to be independent. Why did I have to push them so, and expect so much of them? Why was it so important to me that they reach for the stars? Why couldn't I let them settle for what was here and safe and close at hand? Thinking that, I am all too aware that it is entirely possible that nothing I said or did to sway them or otherwise damage them would have any effect on their choices in life; that it is possible, even probable, that they would have become the fabulous people they are in spite of my fumbling mothering. Just the same, I wish it had been different; that time had moved more slowly, that I had been less busy, and less worried; that I could have savoured it more, or remembered it well. I once had a friend, long ago when Kerrie was in preschool, who told me about the day her daughter was born. Her own mother came into the hospital room soon after the birth and asked, "What do you have, a son or a daughter?" "A daughter!" she was beaming, but her mother began to cry. When she asked what the tears were for, her mother told her, "Your heart will break a thousand times." I think of that story often, whenever my heart is breaking.
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