Today is the first day of my second half of “adulting.” Some people would say, “Whoa Nelly! Don’t jump the gun!” You see, my eldest child, my 22 year old son started his new adult life today, but I still have three kids in the cooker. That said, I’ve always been one to look ahead and I think I saw the writing on the wall when my eldest got his driver’s license. The fact that this new phase of my life was right around the corner became even more evident when he went off to college, which involved study abroad and internships in which he lived far, far away and came through the experiences alive and well and an even better, more interesting young man than he was before the adventures. So obviously, I see where this is going with the rest of my brood, soon to be following suit.
I had my eldest son when I was 25. I have spent most of my adult years being a mom. “Mom” has been my primary title, identity and structure of my life until yesterday when I “let” one little birdie fly the nest. At that moment, I felt that structure crack a teeny little bit. Seeing my son off to his new adult life was surreal and sort of anti-climatic. You drop your child off at his new apartment, you wish him luck on his first day of his exciting new job, you make sure he has groceries and you sit on your hands and wallet, knowing that he can well afford his own groceries now and your major work with him is done. Your part of the masterpiece has mostly concluded and your role has changed from nurturer, teacher, mentor, protector, provider to mostly now, just an excited observer. The scale has slowly shifted from predominantly shared adventures to now sharing with each other our mostly individual adventures.
As any parent having gone through this transition knows, the mixed bag of emotions being felt is tumultuous and almost undefinable. I have heard that we can fit all of our emotions into four simple categories: mad, glad, sad and scared. Well, I’m here to tell you that it is possible to feel all of those emotional categories all at once and deeply!
I have started this blog for me, but if it is helpful to others that would be grand. I have always felt that when people truly share what is really on their hearts, the world is a little less lonely. I don’t know where my second half of adulting leads me but I am certainly in the contemplation stage. And this new stage of my adventure is probably very similar to my son’s new experience – exciting, scary, exhilarating, freeing, introspective and necessary for us both to further develop into what we are meant to be in this mystery called Life.