The house is very quiet since we got on a plane and
flew over 2,500 miles to New York with our daughter two weeks ago to drop her
off for a summer college program.
Looking back, it was an integral part to feeling comfortable with
leaving her there for six weeks—we were able to walk around town and get an
idea of the vibe and the people, and we were able to tour many parts of the
University and interact with several of the professors and professional
resources available to the students.
Day three, after we’d walked to a local science center and to
the downtown commons, I felt good about leaving her—really good, actually. Thinking about it now doesn’t prevent a
little bit of self doubt to creep in.
Not the self-doubt of leaving her there to have her first adult
experience on her own, but the kind of self-doubt of letting her fly away from
the nest at day ten instead of day fourteen, and not really feeling any kind of
anxiety about it.
I was sad when we told her goodbye, hugging … tears mingled
with sweat from a hot day walking around campus. I was sad when we went back to the hotel and
she wasn’t there, the quiet settling in.
I was sad in the morning when I woke up to get ready to get on the plane
to go back home. Basically, I was sad
the entire day, especially so when we arrived home to a quiet, empty house with
her absence made more prominent by her cat, Sully, laying in her empty bed and
wondering when she’ll be home again to snuggle with him.
Missing her life force floating around the house, the noise
bouncing off the walls … reminds me of a time in my life back in elementary
school when the melancholy and loneliness would set in like a thick fog after
spending the weekend having a friend’s spirit share my space for a day or
two. I’m not sure why, but come Sunday
evening the grief of their absence was crushing and I cried myself to
sleep. But, it got easier as I grew up
and so is the case today.
A friend recently asked how and what we were doing in my
daughter’s absence. Not a lot has really
changed, to be honest. We do the same
things minus one person, although I do find myself wishing she was here to
share the same memories. “You’re
empty-nesting,” my friend pointed out.
Bryan agrees with this assessment, but I’m not sure yet. I vacillate and swing between the feeling of
it just being the two of us and feeling like we’ve broken the plate and she’s
graduated and away at college to the thought that she’s really only away on a
trip and will be back in a month. I
guess it’s kind of an in-between feeling, if I’m really honest. At the very least, it does give me a taste of
what it will be like when the time comes for her to go off to college.
So, I sit here and
reflect under a full-moon … the quiet that has settled on our house as
of late will soon be broken once again at another moon’s turn.
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