Motherhood – Live Now and Zen

Bringing New Life To An Empty Nest

by MeSeptember 12, 20224 Comments

I fell off the blog wagon this summer, partially due to life (son’s graduation, travel, house maintenance, family priorities) and partially due to feeling too emotionally scattered to write. I never run out of opinions to share, but I do run out of energy to deal with the jumble of unrelated thoughts in my head. Overwhelm. That is what does me in. To write, you need mental space and time with your thoughts. And because it was such an emotional summer for me as I careened towards the empty nest my husband and I now inhabit, I checked out. Focusing too long on the grief in my heart was not where I wanted to be, nor where I felt I should be as my youngest embarked on his exciting new adventure. I kept telling myself I would break down and navigate the tangled web emotions I was cycling through in background mode in due time. I suspect that time is coming soon.

What happens when you have too much time and a label maker

In the meantime, though, I have been celebrating the good. Our sons are moved in at school, settled into their study routines, and making the most of their college experiences. Thing Two’s transition has been seamless. I don’t think he missed one orientation workshop or opportunity to make new friends. Thing One has been reunited with his college sweetheart, and all is well in his world too. A thousand miles away, we are finding empty nest life kind of refreshing, honestly. Sure. It’s quiet at home, except for the barking of our sporty dogs, but we’re finding ways to distract ourselves. We’ve begun the digging out from underneath the clutter that accumulates when you spend 21 years putting your nuclear family ahead of everything else. We’ve also been meeting up with friends for long-overdue dinners and trying new things, like pickleball. We have relished peaceful nights picking shows we want to watch and enjoying them with a glass of wine and a couple chocolate truffles. So, all things considered, we’re settling into this new phase of life, to quote Larry David, pretty, pretty, pretty good.

With all the newly regained downtime, though, I’ve been doing some reflecting. Our satisfaction with our journey in this life comes down this: we make choices, and our ability to negotiate our expectations about those choices versus the reality those choices bring determines our general level of satisfaction. We chose to have children. The expectation was , if all went well, they would eventually move on to create their own lives, make their own choices, and navigate their own expectations. That has come to fruition, and we are grateful for it. In the aftermath of their departure for their own adventures, Steve and I have new choices to make. What do we want our lives to look like now? What will we choose to prioritize going forward? Yes. There is some grief in giving your children to the world, but there is joy there too. The most important thing I can do is recognize my choice in this moment. I can choose to feel superfluous now that I’ve retired from 21 years as a full-time parent or I can choose to find my next adventure. I can wallow in the vastness an empty and clean house or I can find something new to occupy the space left in the boys’ absence.

To that end, may I introduce Puppy-To-Be-Named-Later, scheduled for a late October arrival.

Life is full of decisions. There will be plenty of time to imagine my next career move later. For now, though, I will fill our empty nest with puppy breath, tiny barks, and dog hair and I will occupy myself with frequent walks, potty training, and breaking up raucous scuffles. It might just end up feeling like the old days, when our sons were young and needed me, all over again.

A Colorado Avalanche Legacy

by MeJune 28, 2022Leave a comment

We are an NHL family. My husband and I have been Colorado Avalanche fans since the team first came to Colorado from Quebec in 1995. During the Avs’ 2000-2001 season, I became pregnant with our first child. My due date, based on my best guess memory of my most recent menstrual cycle, was calculated to be July 26th, 2001. The hockey season progressed alongside my pregnancy, and the Avalanche were killing it. Thanks, in part, to team captain Joe Sakic’s phenomenal scoring year (118 points from 54 goals and 64 assists), the Avs completed the regular season with 118 points, winning the President’s Trophy. Steve and I were over the moon. Hockey is fun to watch, but it’s a lot more fun to watch when your team is showing up in a big way.

Scrapbook page I made during Joe’s first year as an Avs fan

The team entered the playoffs and we did not miss a game. I was still working as a technical writer and editor for the National Renewable Energy Lab and started my day in the office at 6:30 a.m., but that did not stop pregnant, tired me from staying up late so as not to miss any of the action. When we progressed to the championship series against the New Jersey Devils and were down 3-2, to put on a brave face knowing we might lose our shot at the cup, I told Steve it was okay if we lost because then at least I would get some much needed sleep. But, we didn’t lose. We came back from that 3-2 deficit to win the series and the Stanley Cup on June 9th, roughly seven weeks from my due date. When the clock ran on out on that last game and the jubilant Avs players threw their sticks in the air and flew off the bench to celebrate, I screamed and jumped up and down like a crazy person for minutes. My heart was racing. I was over the moon. When Steve and I finally were able to soak in the win and relax, we went to bed with an early alarm set so we could wake up and drive downtown to pick up Stanley Cup Champion merchandise.

On the morning of the 10th, we drove down to the Sports Castle on Broadway and picked up our gear and began trying to figure out if we’d be able to attend the Championship parade on Monday. Later that day, we took the light rail downtown to see a Colorado Rockies game at Coors Field. It was 90 degrees when we got to the ball game. I was feeling a little off, which I attributed to my pregnancy, the heat, and my lack of sleep the night before. At some point, though, I became aware that my water was definitely leaking. We decided to go to the EMS at the field to get their opinion. There were two EMTs there, both male. They inquired about my due date and asked if I was having contractions. I told them I didn’t think so. They took my vitals, noticed I was not soaked down there, and dismissed my concern as an overreaction by an irrational pregnant lady. I didn’t appreciate their cavalier attitude, so I called my midwife. She told me to get in a cab immediately and meet her at the hospital.

The boys with Bernie in the age of Covid

At the hospital, I measured 3 centimeters dilated and 50% effaced. I was in labor. Because my due date was still seven weeks out, the doctor made the decision to stop my labor. They medicated me to stop contractions, checked me into a room, and told me they would have an ultrasound tech check my amniotic fluid levels the next day. The ultrasound revealed too much fluid had been lost, and the doctor ordered Pitocin to stimulate labor again. I panicked. We hadn’t even had a baby shower yet. The nursery was not finished. I had no car seat, no onesies, no diapers, no nothing. The midwife, doctors, and nurses said we would have time to gather all that up because our infant would likely remain in the NICU for 6-8 weeks. It was a lot to absorb, but it was what it was. We made our peace with it and tried to remain positive.

I watched the Stanley Cup parade from the hospital. Labor was induced around 4 p.m., and our five-pound son was born at 12:31 a.m. on June 12th, a little over 48 hours after the Avs had won the Stanley Cup. As soon as I heard him cry and knew he was breathing, I inquired how long they would be keeping him in the hospital. The nurse (and I will never forget this) turned to me and replied, “Oh no. This one goes home with you.” Our son had scored 8/10 on the APGAR. I had gotten my conception timing wrong and we, thankfully, had a fully cooked baby after all. Steve and his parents went shopping to buy baby gear. I was told to pick a name for the birth certificate because we would both be released into the world the next day.

Joe in his Sakic sweater watching Gretzky offer post-game commentary

We decided to name him Joe as a nod to Joe Sakic, and our son’s tie to Colorado Avalanche history was cemented. We’ve attended hockey games with our sons since they were infants, sometimes as a family of four and sometimes with my Avs fan father-in-law who would always buy the boys the something at the game. Joe went to his first Avs game on October 31st, 2001, when he was five months old. Joe has always had Avalanche gear, onesies and toddler rompers gave way to t-shirts and sweatshirts. For his first birthday, my sister gifted Joe an adult-size Joe Sakic sweater, which we held onto until his 18th birthday.

An Avs doll (Matt Duchesne) hanging out at our house

Steve and I watched every game, save one, in the Avalanche playoff series this year, missing just the first game in the Stanley Cup series because it played out while we were asleep on a cruise ship in the Mediterranean. Joe refused to miss that game, however, waking up at 2 a.m. to watch it in his cabin in the Joe Sakic hockey sweater he had hauled to Europe from home. We woke up at 4 a.m., ahead of our planned flight home from Rome, to catch the final period of the second game in the Stanley Cup series in Italian. Twenty one years and fourteen days after our Joe was born, the Colorado Avalanche, helmed by Executive Vice President and General Manager Joe Sakic, won their third Stanley Cup two days ago on June 26th. Yesterday, I took our grown sons to a sports store to buy us all Stanley Cup championship gear. We’ve come full circle.

On 6/26/22, our son’s namesake, Joe Sakic, hoisted the Stanley Cup a third time, this time as General Manager

Watching Avalanche hockey with our sons over the past two decades, both in person and on the television, has been a priceless gift. These games are family ritual, this team part of our family identity. And this Thursday, I will finally get to attend a Stanley Cup parade here in Denver and I’ll get to do it alongside my Joe. I’m not sure what the legacy of this year’s Colorado Avalanche team will be, but I know the legacy the Colorado Avalanche organization has created in our family.

All the small things, indeed.

If our family has a theme song, this is it now and forever. Go, Avs!

My Stock Market Took A Plunge

by MeJune 24, 20226 Comments

There are dramatic moments in your life you never forget. Most people my age will remember exactly where they were when the Challenger exploded or the planes hit the Twin Towers. Maybe they even can recall, as I can, the elation and sense of possibility they felt when they watched the Berlin Wall come down. I had one of those memorable moments today. I was sitting at our kitchen island working on my laptop when my oldest said, “The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.” I turned slowly to look at him. My expression must have landed somewhere between disbelief, disgust, and dyspepsia because then he followed up with, “They did. I saw it on my news feed a little while ago.”

I knew it was coming. I’ve known for a while now. Still, I was not prepared to have it knock the wind out of me. Nor did I expect the tears would come as quickly as they did.

I know there are women who tonight are going to bed saying prayers of gratitude to their god for this ruling. I know they think this will save innocent lives. I know they feel a wrong has been righted. I know they will rejoice about it in church and with their friends and family. They will celebrate. I don’t begrudge them their right to feel vindicated. They’ve waited a long time for this.

I wish I could find reason to rejoice in this, but I cannot. Tonight I am going to bed with the understanding that a majority on Supreme Court believe a woman’s life is less important than the life of a fetus. And don’t give me chat about how this is just a course correction because Roe. v Wade was unconstitutional and this should be a states’ matter anyway. I get where you are coming from with all that. It’s just different for me. To quote American Idol’s Randy Jackson, “You see, dawg, for me, it’s just the mere concept that the government can determine and force my reproductive choice, or any choice, well, that’s gotta be a big no from me.” My entire life, I had rights my mother and grandmother did not have. I had them when I woke up today and then they were gone by lunch. Poof!

It’s just hard because, while I know my value, I just realized the government has reset my worth.

Henry David Thoreau-ing It

by MeMay 27, 20221 Comment

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, to discover that I had not lived.” ~Henry David Thoreau

Me a bunch of years ago celebrating at Red Rocks (with food I can no longer eat)

Birthdays over age 50 are something else. On the one hand, you have to acknowledge you are definitely over that hill and the time ahead for you is far less than the time behind you. On the other hand, you know people who have already left this world, perhaps classmates that didn’t make it to your advanced age, and you are grateful to be here. It’s a mixed bag. I’m simultaneously glad to be 54 and annoyed to be 54. But time marches on and the only way to stop it is death, and that is not an option I am anxious to explore. My fingers are crossed that my luck continues to hold.

While I did not go into the woods like Henry David Thoreau, this month I have been taking a much needed hiatus from social media. My reasons are a little different than Thoreau’s, but the thought is the same. I wanted to eliminate the bullshit. I wanted to face only the essentials of life, to see what those people around me and the situations we shared in person together could offer me. I wanted to delete the distractions provided by the socials. I wanted to ensure I wasn’t wasting my life gawking at other people’s lives. And I needed to make sure I wasn’t so busy presenting a life to others that I was no longer consciously living one myself. I picked a curious time to do it too, given that this month is filled with experiences one would love to post on social media…birthdays, graduations, parties, reunions, and travel.

Still, I’m not doing it quite right. I admit to playing some games on my iPhone and watching playoff hockey and episodes of Formula 1: Drive to Survive. I’m not checked in 100% of the time, but I am present more than I have been. This is both good and bad, as I’m struggling with accepting that our youngest will graduate one week from today, and in August we will drive both sons to Washington and leave them (along with part of our hearts) there and return to an empty house. So it’s useful to give myself, from time to time, the opportunity not to focus on the huge changes that are afoot. It’s important to feel your feelings, but it’s my birthday and I don’t want to spend it sobbing about my most challenging, most favorite job ever coming to an end.

This weekend, Steve and I will be taking scuba classes. This should keep my mind off my kids and allow me to celebrate myself and my life and what I am able to learn, overcome, and accomplish, even at the advanced age of 54. This weekend I start the next phase of my life even as the last one is wrapping up. It’s time to make new friends. And if everything goes well and my ears clear and I don’t freak out underwater trying things that are way outside my comfort zone, on Sunday I will finish my first two dives at the aquarium among my new fish friends. I’ve done a lot of exploring on land in my life. Time to see what the sea has to offer.

I’ve decided to refer to this social media time out as “Henry David Thoreau-ing it.” I think he would appreciate my wisdom and the shout out.

Walking With Dinosaurs Again

by MeMay 24, 2022May 24, 20225 Comments

“Let your age get old but not your heart.” ~Unknown

Joe, likely watching dinosaurs something dinosaur related, circa 2005

Our son, Joe, is a college sophomore. He has been interested in dinosaurs since he was about 3. We are not sure what first fueled his intense curiosity about them, but we’ve narrowed it down to Disney’s Dinosaur film (circa 2000), any of the library of Land Before Time films (1988-2007), or the BBC television production called Walking with Dinosaurs (1999). While we don’t know which show originally piqued his interest, we do know that we spent hours upon hours watching those productions with him. I partially credit Joe’s fascination with dinosaurs with our initial discovery of Joe’s learning disabilities. It made zero sense to us that a four year old who could instantly recognize a specific type of dinosaur and share with us its name, its size, and the period in which it lived, along with myriad other facts about it, could not remember that we told him to pick up his shoes and carry them up the stairs a minute earlier. He had an insanely acute long-term memory and a dismal short-term one. But, I digress.

Over the years since then, even as he discovered new interests (geology, flags, geography, history, world religions, travel, and geopolitics), his passion for dinosaurs was always running in background. As new discoveries were made, he would share them with us. At those times, be he 8 or 14 or 18, he would become so excited and animated and awestruck about his new knowledge that we would transported back to the days when four year old Joe was regaling us with dinosaur facts. Dinosaurs, a link to Earth’s past, have been our link to Joe’s past.

Yesterday, a new BBC series premiered on Apple TV+. Joe texted me the links to the first trailer for this show over a month ago, as soon as it was available online. I hadn’t heard Joe this excited about anything in a while. Joe’s ADHD provides him with this marvelous capacity for hyper focus. When he discovers something that captures his imagination, he becomes temporarily obsessed with it. He learns everything he can about it, and he passes his knowledge along to us, whether or not we find the subject as compelling as he does. So, yesterday, I was asked to join him in watching the first episode of five, one being released each day this week. Yesterday’s show was about the coasts and the creatures that inhabited them during the Cretaceous period. Even if you are not a dinosaur aficionado, I suggest you find this show and watch it. It will obliterate what you thought you knew about these creatures. Everything I learned about the dinosaurs while I was growing up has evolved with the discovery of new dinosaur fossils and the use of current technologies to analyze them. Science is amazing. And although I knew some of the changes that have occurred in our knowledge about the magnificent creatures of the Cretaceous thanks to Joe, I am still learning more through the series.

I can’t explain what a treat it is to watch our nearly 21 year old son seeing these episodes for the first time. After years of railing against the inaccuracies of the plastic model dinosaurs he would see and sometimes purchase (it seems Joe knows more about the dinosaurs than the toy companies that produce their likenesses), it was a delight to listen to Joe ooh and ahh over the depiction of the creatures in this series. He paused the show several times to tell me what has changed and how we know what we know now. He also paused the recording a few times to cry out, “That is speculation, but there is science behind it so it is possible.”

Yesterday morning I surreptitiously captured this photo of our deep-thinking, curious son investigating the first few moments of the first episode of Prehistoric Planet up close. I wish I had recorded it on video because there were audible oohs as he watched. I teared up seeing him like that because, although he is much taller and heavier now than he was when he was 3 and first discovered dinosaurs, for the briefest of moments there I could have sworn he was 18 years younger. I will never be able to hold that young boy in my arms again, but it brings me great joy to realize that the evolution of our human understanding about dinosaurs will continue to offer me opportunities to see that sweet child again and revel in his excitement about the world. My heart is full.

There was audible “oohs” when I was taking this photo

The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare (Abridged) (Revised)

by MeMay 12, 20221 Comment

Saw our last school play

Parting is such sweet sorrow

We will miss these days

Tonight, we attend our son’s last performance in a school play. We loved watching Luke in plays. Although he had zero desire to pursue drama in school, we sure did enjoy seeing him act when he was forced to. Tonight’s play was a hilarious summarization of William Shakespeare’s works, which pleased his English major mom. It was presented by the Honors Literature class, and it was perfection. Cheeky, inappropriate, and hysterical. And, of course, Luke killed it as Juliet.

And as I was watching the play, thinking about how this was the last time I would see Luke perform this way, this lyric was playing in my head:

“I can’t remember all the times I tried to tell my myself to hold on to these moments as they pass.” ~Counting Crows

Don’t Mess With The Senate

by MeMay 9, 2022May 9, 20228 Comments

When our youngest was in 8th grade, his teacher told me he thought Luke had a good shot of becoming his class valedictorian. I thought it was sort of a crazy thing to say to a parent, but I took it to heart because Mr. Beckwith was a no-nonsense, honors literature teacher with high expectations. He was not the type to throw around undeserved praise. At the continuation ceremony, each homeroom teacher spoke briefly about their students. Mr. Beckwith said this about Luke:

“We call him The Senate. That is what he liked to be called*. But unlike the Senate that the adults are accustomed to, Luke works really, really hard. He is a diligent, quiet leader, but don’t let that fool you. He has a powerful, powerful voice in class. And his work ethic, I can’t stress this enough, it sets the bar for everyone around him. He raises the level of excellence by just walking into a room. It’s pretty profound. Luke, you will be missed but never forgotten.”

As a parent, I was blown away by Mr. Beckwith’s words of praise and by his assertion of where Luke might be able to take his high school career. When we left the ceremony, I told Luke what Mr. Beckwith had shared with me about being valedictorian. Luke’s eyes lit up. In that moment, I immediately regretted my words. Luke is a formidable person who sees a challenge and makes it a goal. He’s like a border collie with a job: get out of his way and watch how quickly and efficiently he lines everything up and puts it away. Like Mr. Beckwith, I knew well how hard Luke works, and I wondered if I had just doomed him to a difficult and decidedly un-fun high school career.

Luke started freshman year with honors English and social studies. Sophomore year he added honors math and science. Already a student ambassador, Luke joined Student Senate. He was inducted into the National Honor Society and became an officer for that. By senior year, he was Lead Ambassador, NHS president, and a leader on the cross-country team in addition to maintaining straight As in all his honors and elective classes. I regularly asked him if he wanted t have friends over. He regularly declined. My worst fears were realized. He was working too hard, I thought. I told him repeatedly he could try giving 90% sometimes instead of 110%. My words went in one ear and out the other.

Last Friday, the dean of the high school announced the senior awards. When he was about to name the valedictorian, he noted there were two this year and said he would announce them in alphabetical order. I held my breath since our last name begins with W and I know Luke is the last kid in his class alphabetically. The dean named the first student and went through his academic and community achievements. Then he named the second valedictorian. It was Luke. Although Luke had carefully been monitoring his progress towards his goal and thought he had a good shot at it, you never know until the fat lady sings, right? He scanned the room for us, looked right at his father and I, and waved, just like he did when he was on stage for the Christmas program when he was in kindergarten. He was beaming. He’d done it. He’d locked his gaze on his goals, rounded them up, and escorted them, one by one, into the pen until he saw the gate close behind them. Mr. Wood later announced that Luke was also voted Senior of the Year by the teachers because, of course, he was.

I recount this story about our upward climbing Luke not to brag or because I had anything to do with his accomplishments (other than being his chauffeur). I tell this story because 9 years ago, I sat in my kitchen and wept after I heard a dyslexia specialist quizzing Luke and realized my 3rd grader skipped letters in a recitation of the alphabet, couldn’t name the days of the week in order, or name even half of the twelve months of the year. I cried because before she left she told me Luke needed to go to a special school. She told me his dyslexia was severe, and he was years behind other students. Years. He would likely never read well. Looking back now, though, I know I shouldn’t have worried. That specialist knew a lot of things, but she didn’t know Luke. She didn’t understand the power of The Senate.

(*Luke liked to be called The Senate in 8th grade because of his love of Star Wars. It was a joke he made once with his classmates and it stuck. He’s as powerful as Palpatine, but he has no desire to join the Senate.)

Perspective From Two Hours On A Flight Next To A Hungry, Tired Toddler

by MeApril 18, 2022April 19, 2022Leave a comment

Sitting in the small airplane, four seats wide, sharing the row with a young mother of three with a screaming toddler on her lap. Toddler is tossing everything she is handed onto the floor.

“It’s been a while since I had littles,” I tell her with as much patience and understanding and motherly wisdom as I can muster, “but I remember those days well. No worries.”

Her four year old son sitting behind me kicks my seat the entire flight, stopping only to push both feet long and slow into my lower back. Six year old daughter next to him bugging him for the iPad. The mom next to me looks exhausted and, boy, do I get it. Her toddler thrashes in her arms, grabs my hair and pulls. The mom is mortified and apologizes, and I nod with understanding. It’s been seventeen years since I last held a wailing toddler on a flight, but that experience never leaves you. The muscle memory of the anxiety and embarrassment remains fresh.

The toddler in her lap, likely desperately tired and frustrated, begins howling with increasing ferocity. The mom hands her off to her husband who is sitting next to their oldest daughter across the aisle from the young ones behind me. As her daughter thrashes like a shark in shallow water, the mom shrinks, puts her head in her hands, and shakes it slowly back and forth. I know she is counting the seconds until her tiny creation at last succumbs to the sleep she needs.

As she is doing this, I look out my window-seat rectangle with its rounded corners. I am grateful to be wearing a mask as the silent tears slip behind the fiber filter on my face. You see, I said goodbye again to my almost 21 year old this morning after I passed him the four bottles of wine we couldn’t fit into our checked luggage. And I’m heading home to my high school senior who will be moving away in four month’s time. The ache this mom is feeling as she wishes the time on this two-and-a-half hour journey would pass more quickly is a similar ache I am feeling as I wish these last few months would pass more slowly.

I would never tell her these things, as she will be in my shoes far sooner than she can fathom. She will discover in her own time the way childhood speeds up as it approaches puberty and adulthood. What starts as seconds moving as sand grains, imperceptibly draining through the narrow tube in an hourglass ends as deluge of sand dumped from a toddler’s beach pail. And this mom will learn, as I did, that those prayers for time to speed up aren’t selective. Time doesn’t speed for the rough moments without also speeding for the good moments. Time is brutal that way. Lucky parents will learn this the hard way, seeing their children mature in the blink of an eye and move on. We’re the fortunate ones, the ones who get to see their children reach adulthood. Many parents don’t have that same good fortune.

For now, I say a silent prayer for this mom in opposition to her prayer to speed time up. I pray that she will embrace all the moments with some quiet, inexplicable gratitude for what they are because she will be like me sooner than she knows, with greying hair and reading glasses, hugging her adult son and handing him wine bottles. She will be both excited to get home to her high school senior and afraid to get there because she knows there are 46 days until graduation.

Parenting is the greatest purveyor of perspective I’ve found. It simultaneously breaks me and saves me over and over again.

The Professor And His First Lecture

by MeApril 6, 2022Leave a comment

You have to be confident to choose that outfit, though

Public speaking. It’s anxiety-inducing for most of us, which is why most of us are impressed by those who do it well. Our house has one member who does not fear speaking in front of others. In fact, Luke was born with two traits most people lack: self-confidence and a gift for public speaking. When I say born with, I’m not joking. For most people, confidence comes either through racking up a series of successes or repeatedly messing things up and then realizing we survived that calamity successfully. Luke needed neither of those experiences to acquire confidence. He simply had it in spades from the beginning.

From the age of two, Luke’s confidence allowed him to work a room. His toddler birthday parties were a dream. He would open a gift, carry on as if it (a toy, a blanket, a toddler potty, a dollar bill) was the greatest thing he’d ever seen, and then he would run to the gift giver and hug them. It was something else. We couldn’t have trained him to do that if we’d tried. When he was in first grade, we were looking at some of his art work. He looked at me and asked, “Am I pretty good at art or am I amazing at it?” He didn’t even consider that he might be meh at it like I would have. Another time around that same age, while he and his brother were discussing attractiveness, Luke said, “I’m attractive. I’m totally attractive. I’m like 300% attractive.” Well, okay then, I thought. The thing about Luke, though, is you can tell those statements aren’t made because he’s overcompensating for a lack of self-esteem or because he’s an arrogant little weasel. He just knows who he is and he’s comfortable with it. He also knows what he wants and how he will get it. He’s not conceited. He’s convinced.

His gift for public speaking first showed itself in school plays, where he was often given the funniest line and would deliver it and soak up the laughs like a lizard soaks up the sun. He would volunteer to give presentations to his class or other classes. When his voice dropped, his public speaking presence only increased. In junior high, he was chosen to lead tours for school visitors. He quickly became a Lead Ambassador in high school. Then he ran for offices in the Student Senate and the school chapter of the National Honor Society and won. Along the way, he kept killing it at public speaking. All students are required to compete in the Great Debates during junior year, and Luke finished in the top four. During senior year, students are asked to give a 50-minute presentation on a topic of their choosing. Most students think of this as something they have to get through. Luke started considering topics for his presentation his freshman year.

Last night, Luke stood in our living room and did his final practice for his Senior Symposium presentation today. His topic? Mars in Science Fiction. Luke started practicing for us on Sunday. He quickly realized he would run long with the copious amounts of information he had (he calculated he had read 8200 pages of science fiction about Mars over the years), so he presented to us again on Monday night with a reduced format and nailed the timing. Last night he practiced in front of us one last time. He was ready. Here he is in a one-minute practice snippet, which he granted permission for me to share:

It’s not easy to present with a dog wandering in and out and it’s not easy to film when your subject is working the room

Luke’s plans at this point are to become a college professor. That could change, of course, but he is aware that his comfort with public speaking is a gift and something he should find a way to use in his life. When we watched him give his speech, I have to admit that I could imagine him as a professor. He needed no notes. He spoke extemporaneously with little effort, comfortable in his subject-matter expertise. He was excited to give his speech to his classmates today. When he got in the car at the end of the day, he was ebullient. He was still hyped up over his presentation, for which received accolades.

It’s something else to see someone using their gifts. It reminds you that you should be doing something with your own.

Sadness Is On Me, But I Am Not Sad

by MeApril 3, 2022Leave a comment

Senior year for our youngest has flown by. I know this is how it works. Senior year is heartbreaking, expensive, and fast as hell. I tried to keep it together while standing there watching the photographer take his senior photos. I struggled when I had to compose his senior page for the yearbook. He applied to five private colleges (University of Denver, St. Olaf, Reed, Whitman, and Skidmore), received acceptances to all of them, and then committed to attending Whitman in Washington with his brother, which gave me a measure of comfort while still making me sad. With that decision made, I designed his graduation announcements. And today I created a graduation collage for display at his high school in May. Jesus help me. It feels like the universe is trying to break me.

I would like to think all of this is preparation so I can cry myself out before the actual graduation ceremony, but I know that is a false hope. Graduation is rapidly approaching. So I went ahead and made a countdown clock to the ceremony because I need to prepare myself. As of today, we are 60 days out, which means I have 60 days to cry myself free of tears lest I end up an ugly-crying, embarrassing, Alice Cooper look-a-like at the ceremony. I don’t want to be that momma. Luke deserves better.

I have a distinct memory of a time when Luke was around six months old and woke up in the middle of the night. I remember sitting with him in a rocking chair in our living room, rocking and waiting for him to drift back off to sleep. When Joe woke up in the night, I would get so frustrated about the sleep interruption. As he was my first and I was not used to missing out on sleep, it was a struggle for me to be present when all I wanted was some damn sleep. With Luke, though, I knew it would be my last time to hold my sleeping child, so I tried to focus on the moments, to appreciate that this little person needed comfort and I was that comfort. It’s such a different feeling now as I focus on my present moments with Luke because I know he is almost finished needing me. I suppose this is what drives the sadness I am feeling. We have come full circle, Luke and I. My baby is ready to launch. And although I knew this day would come eventually and have been preparing for it since Joe’s graduation, the reality of it happening now is something I’m not sure I would ever be able to prepare for.

So, perhaps, I will go to graduation and cry like the soft, mushy person I am on the inside because this too is part of the experience. I don’t have to like it. I don’t have to stay dry-eyed for it. I have to be there in it because there are only two constants in life, growth and change. Wait. I forgot taxes. So I guess that makes three constants. Growth. Change. Taxes.

I found this on Facebook the other day and it offers a different perspective of sadness:

So I am recognizing now that sadness is upon me. It doesn’t have to live here. It’s just here now. It doesn’t define me. I am not a sad person. I am a happy person with sad moments. And it’s okay to be sad sometimes. We’re meant to be sad sometimes. It means we’re fully experiencing what life offers. Sometimes we want it to be offering lollipops, unicorns, and rainbows, and it instead presents us with pain, overwhelm, and darkness. That is when we need to remember that if the sadness can be upon us, so too can the rainbows. I have 60 days to figure out how to find those rainbow-covered unicorns that hand out lollipops. If I can’t find one, maybe I’ll just have to become one. I’m sure the other parents would appreciate a lollipop at graduation. I think they’ve earned at least that.