Tag: empty nest

Their Roots Entwined

Last night I watched my four kids laughing, and joking, and teasing and talking and even squabbling a little bit, and I felt my heart soaked in gratefulness, awe and love for these most precious people, whom I have been privileged to raise. When they were little, I must have taken it for granted that they would always be this little band of four – the oldest, curly-headed ginger leading the pack, not far behind him, his brother, the adventurer and the instigator, followed by the youngest blue-eyed boy, (yet the biggest pup of the litter) and finally, keeping up and keeping them all in line, their brave and beautiful little sister. And then the growing up and the “growing beyond” happened, and it happened so fast.

Last night I got a glimpse. I got a glimpse of the roots that they all share which keep my children’s feet firmly planted on the Earth, even as their individual blossoms are spreading far and away. Those roots are strong. They have a base of roots entwined with a shared history, camaraderie, memories, and shared DNA. They all have had the shared experience of my husband and I, forging our perspectives and hopes and ideas, of what lives lived well, look like, and they will be able to nourish their own perspectives, hopes and ideas from the nutrients they share, from down deep under the surface of our family soil.

It Truly Is

I’m really happy today. I am so happy that I’m actually kind of giddy. We finally got most of our things put away, that were all over our house due to a renovation, and it feels so cleansing and clearing. My younger sons picked up our eldest son at the airport last night, after midnight. I got up at 2:30 a.m. and I peeked in the doors of all of my babies. I haven’t done that in a long while. They were all four sound asleep in their beds. Then I went back to my bed and had some of the best sleep that I have slept in a long time. There is probably not a more nurturing, comforting feeling in a mama’s heart, than all of her children sleeping peacefully under one roof. We have a big day of activities planned to celebrate my youngest son’s high school graduation. There will be a lot of laughing and joking. I will be a brunt of a lot of those jokes and I will love it. Life is good.

“One thing I had learned from watching chimpanzees with their infants is that having a child should be fun.” – Jane Goodall

It is, Jane. It truly is.

Ehh, It’s Friday

funny friday quotes for work

Happy Friday, friends and readers!!!  This one felt “long in coming” didn’t it?!?  New readers, I love Fridays.  We don’t go into deep subjects on Fridays here at Adulting – Second Half.  On Fridays, I discuss three favorite things/songs/websites/ideas, etc. and I highly encourage you to share your favorites (anything goes!) in the Comments section. Please check out previous Friday posts for more favorites.  Here are today’s favorites and they are all random and in no specific category:

Sconza Chocolates Lemoncello Chocolate Almonds – My family  first had these “euphoria for your mouth” almonds in California last summer.  I was absolutely delighted when Costco started carrying them, although I have the feeling that they were a limited special purchase.  Get these yellow nuggets of gastro gold, however you can.  Find a way.  I would beg, borrow and steal for this candy.  And you know, on a happy note, almonds are a super food . . . .

Next, by now, you regular readers know how much I love Think Smarter on Twitter.  I attribute 60-70 percent of my “smarts” to this feed.  Below is my favorite post yet.  They posted it just a few days ago.  I LOVE when a few words can encapsulate a feeling, or an experience, or a nuance that we all can relate to:

 

(It’s not just “human” that this applies to – our dogs have idiosyncrasies that evoke the same smile in my heart)

Final favorite this Friday –

Frontgate Ultralight Slimline 4-Step Ladder – I may have shared this one already, this is how much I love it.  It bears repeating.  This is not your average step ladder.  Granted, it is not inexpensive but it is worth every penny.  It is as sturdy as they come, and the best part is that it folds up so skinny that we keep ours in between our washer and our dryer.  This ladder is so skinny, that if it were your friend, you’d secretly hate her.  It is light and easy to carry from room to room, too, so you really only need one of them and it comes in all sorts of color choices.

And a final thought for this Friday as you head out to festivities for the night:

“At every party there are two kinds of people – those who want to go home and those who don’t. The trouble is, they are usually married to each other.”– Ann Landers

Horizons

“A ship in the harbor is safe, but that is not what a ship is built for . . . .”

Tonight, my youngest son graduates from high school. This is the third time that we will experience this event. In some ways, having been through it before, makes it easier. We know what to expect. In some ways, having been through it before, makes it harder. We know what to expect.

When I had my first child, I experienced a depth of feelings that I didn’t know existed. Like many women, when I got pregnant subsequent times after that, I got nervous. I got doubtful. I questioned why we chose to “rock the boat.” When I got pregnant with our second son, I read something that now makes all of the sense in the world to me: “Your first child teaches you about the depth of your love, your subsequent children teach you about the breadth of your love.” Like most children, my four children have always tried to “trip me up” and they have tried to figure out whom I love best. I’ve always reminded them that they are all smart and they are all good at math. You can’t divide or measure “infinite.” It is an impossible task. Infinite love is so overwhelming, vulnerable, awe-inspiring, miraculous, solid and most decidedly, immeasurable.

We’re having another ship leave the shipyard in the next couple of months. His first journey to college won’t be so far away. But journeys beget journeys and tonight signals to me that the anchor is pulled up. He will come back to our little safe harbor from time to time, to fuel up and to share stories of journeys that I won’t be a part of, but I will thrill in, vicariously. He is ready for the journeys. He is a solid ship. The horizon awaits . . . . .

The Disrupted Nest

Once upon a time there was this little bird who loved her nest. She loved being in her nest with her mate and her hatchlings. Of course, her hatchlings quickly grew to be big birds themselves and they started leaving the nest more and more. One hatchling grew up to be his own bird and left the nest and created his own nest, in a tree, far away, of his own liking. The bird family still flew to see each other, though. They were chatty birds, who liked each other’s company.

This story isn’t about hatchlings leaving the nest, though. This is about the time when the little bird’s nest was completely disrupted and the poor little bird thought that she would go cuckoo or even batty. Though a bit flighty, this little bird wasn’t a natural cuckoo, and bats, obviously, are a whole different species, but this little bird found that she was really starting to empathize with cuckoos and those beings sometimes described as batsh*t-crazy. You see, the disruption in her nest felt like it would never end and it was turning her into a whole different animal as much as she tried to stay pleasant and chirpy.

It all started when the little bird and her mate for life, decided that their nest was in serious need of some new straw. They found some birds who were particularly good at nest renovation and they agreed to give lots and lots (and lots) of seed to these birds, in exchange for some fresh straw. When it was time to take out the old straw and bring in the new straw, the expert new straw birds arrived and hung out with the little bird all day long, every day, for months and months. The poor little bird tried to stay positive and she could see that the new straw would soon look very nice, when she looked past all of the old straw, and dust feathers lying all around the nest. She tried not to pluck out the feathers in her chest, in distress, but she found it hard to resist sometimes. She tended to get a little “pecky” with her mate and nestlings who still lived in the nest with her, when they came home to the nest in the evenings.

This little bird was an old bird who had been around the flock for a while. She had even been through previous nest renovations in earlier times in her little birdy life. She knew that the process of the rebuilding of a nest would be annoying and disruptive. The little bird knew some calming yoga poses like standing on one leg that helped her get into balance. (a lot of birds stand on one leg). Still sometimes she felt pushed to the edge of her nest . . . and her sanity.

This story doesn’t have any ending yet, but the nest is progressing a lot and I suspect there is going to be a happy, calming ending for the little bird and her mate. I suspect that they are really going to appreciate the changes and updates to their nest, to the point that they will soon forget about all of the upheaval and disruption that this renovation has caused. And I suspect a few years down the road (maybe give it a decade), they will have conveniently forgotten how stressful it was to have their nest torn apart and displaced (they have little tiny bird brains that aren’t known for good memories – see elephants, for good memorization skills). Then, the little birds again, will get a wild hair (or a wild feather, in their case) and decide to yet again, exchange piles and piles of seed for an updated nest. That’s just how birds work.

Refreshed and Renewed

I’m baaaack! This past weekend is the first weekend that I took off from writing my blog since I started writing it back in July 2018. It felt strange. I automatically sat down to my computer Saturday morning, but then laughed at myself and forced myself to get back up and to do something different. What I learned from this little experiment of mine, was priceless. I missed writing my blog. I missed my readers. A lot.

Sometimes, we fall into patterns and habits and schedules and we wonder how we even ended up in certain “ruts.” I think that I was afraid my writing had become rote to me and to you. But what I learned is, that this writing is necessary for me right now. It is a passion for me. It makes me feel more alive. It is not a habit, but now, almost a necessity for me. It has become part of my breath of life.

This past weekend was a little emotional for me, for many reasons. One of the biggest reasons, was that for the first time, I didn’t celebrate Easter with our six-person nucleus family. My eldest son lives in a different state now and luckily, he was able to spend the holiday with family members and even had other offers for celebrations, that he had to turn down. So he was fine and the rest of us were all together, so we were fine, but it was one of those acute moments of understanding how much our family life is changing and how much it will change, in the years to come.

Building up to Easter, is when my emotions were escalating. I bought so much candy for our kids’ Easter baskets, that the checker asked me if we were having a party. I had to put it on two credit cards. (okay, the credit card part isn’t true, but the first statement IS, pathetically, true) I was obviously in overcompensation mode. The funny thing is though, when Easter rolled around, I felt good. I felt calm. I felt peaceful. I felt hopeful. I felt the promise of the holiday.

Thank you for your understanding my need for a break. Thank you for still coming by to read past posts. (I see the stats.) I hope that whatever your traditions and beliefs are, that you were able to celebrate a beautiful spring weekend with people who you love. I hope that you feel refreshed and renewed. I do. And it feels good.

And This is Eternity

I am at one of those particularly poignant, bittersweet times in parenthood. It is one of those times that almost every moment feels like an ending and a new beginning. My eldest son is now completely and totally independent of us, starting his new adult life, in his new state. My second son is almost halfway done with college. My youngest son starts college in the fall. My daughter just completed her first year of high school and is ready to practice driving.

The first couple of years of a child’s life feels like this – the feeling of constant endings and new beginnings. There are so many milestones that happen almost on a daily basis, it makes your head spin . . . and your heart overflow. Then there is this long period of late elementary/middle school years, where, as much as the changes are still happening in your family, they are not nearly as obvious and confronting, as times like these.

As we were driving home from my daughter’s high school tennis tournament yesterday, she and I were reflecting on her first year of high school and how well it went for her, despite the normal fears and hesitations that she felt at the beginning of the year. We laughed at how worried she was about making the tennis team and how now, it feels like “old hat”. High school, in itself, will be more of an “old hat” for her in the next three years before she departs for journeys further away from home.

My parenting style is doing a major shift right now, too. It is much more “hands off”, freeing of the reigns. I am much more of a sideline advocate and “wise” counsel (when sought) these days. I suppose my job is to worry less about their lives and to put the focus more on my own life now, so that they can worry less about me.

This passage is from a beautiful, enchanting old book by Gwen Frostic. The book, A Walk With Me, is printed by block carvings and it is as lovely to look at, as it is to read. Here it is:

The squirrels jump from limb to limb high in the trees that are ever the same . . . and . . . never the same . . . for each day . . . each hour . . . . all things change. . . . . .the trees . . . the flowers . . . rocks . . . .the sand and the waters . . . the birds and all the animals of earth . . . .

. . . .yet – life goes on unchanged . . . . . . . nothing is new

. . . . . . . nothing is old

this is life . . . . . . . .

and this is eternity . . . . . .

Learning to Let Go

My eldest son got a big promotion at his job and moved just outside of the Big Apple a couple of weeks ago. As much as my heart strings have had to stretch, I am very excited and proud for him to partake in this adventure of a lifetime! Of course, the protective mom part of me is always concerned for his well-being.

We have family that live in that part of the country, but they are still wintering down south and while our son has acquaintances who live up north, I am not aware of anyone he is particularly close to, being in close proximity to his new digs. His work associates are still new to him and they are busy with their own lives and families. My son moved into an apartment without any roommates for the first time in his life. He comes from a big family. Oh my goodness, he must be so lonely! He might be feeling existential grief! (In this paragraph, I’ve just let you peek into where my mind has been swirling the last couple of weeks, in regards to my eldest son.)

So, of course, we have been texting my son regularly and keeping up with his life’s happenings. Turns out he spent his birthday (Friday evening) in Manhattan with some work associates and by the looks of the pictures, he had a blast. He made it safely back to suburbia and texted us beautiful, scenic pictures of a hike he took on a trail not far from his home yesterday.

“Did you hike there all by yourself?” was my tentative text.

“No, I did it with a local hiking group. It was great!” he replied.

Many years ago, when we did our first major move for my husband’s job, we were busy unpacking our things. Our eldest son, a budding first grader announced loudly, “Okay, it’s time to get out and meet some people!”

When he was in college, my son spent a summer semester in a study abroad program, travelling all over Europe. He told us that the Australian kids were particularly fun and wild, staying out to all hours of the night.

“I wonder how he knows that, ” my friend said snidely with a coy look on her pursed lips.

My eldest son has always been a confident, adventurous soul who lives life on his own terms. He has always beat his own drum, and his life’s rhythm has always been an upbeat, interesting, unique, spirited sound. Perhaps I should let my own heart beat along with his drum, instead of the slow, fearful, hesitant, projection of a protective, grasping heartbeat belonging to a loving mother who is having to learn to let go . . . .

Down-Home Wisdom

RIP – Luke Perry. Too soon. So, so sad. Back in the day, my friends and I were huge 90210 fans. How fleeting life can be!

While looking at my newsfeed, I got sidetracked on another bit of news about the musician Jerry Lee Lewis. He recently suffered a minor stroke. As often happens in my course of clicking through news stories, I started researching more and then, being reminded of the movie, Great Balls of Fire!, I somehow ended up downloading a book to my kindle, written by Jerry Lee Lewis’ ex-wife. Now Jerry Lee Lewis has several ex-wives, but this book was written by the notorious ex-wife who was his 13-year-old second cousin and that marriage almost completely derailed his musical career. Her name is Myra Lewis Williams and her book that I downloaded is called, The Spark That Survived.

I am not a huge country music fan. Still, I find myself drawn to the stories of women country musicians who pulled themselves up by their bootstraps and made something of themselves, despite all of the odds against them. They’re as American pioneer as a person can get, in my mind. I have read several articles and exposes about Dolly Parton. I have read more than one book written by Loretta Lynn and I finished The Spark That Survived, in just one sitting. I have found that what these women lack in formal education and “grooming”, they more than make up for, in their sheer pluck, determination, and faith in God and in themselves. They have a grounded common sense that seems to be a lacking quality these days, and I find it so refreshing to hear their honest, true voices speaking candidly about life and how they see it. These strong country women typically hold nothing back.

Here are some gems I plucked from The Spark That Survived:

On friends – “Friends understand that you dogs come first. Friends understand when you want to spit at your husband but love him dearly anyway. Friends understand your female problems. Friends are there when you go to the hospital, with a nice new set of pretty jammies for you to wear. Friends buy your lunch when you are broke. Friends listen to your troubles and then dismiss them when you do. Sometimes friends cry with you, but most of all they make you laugh and let you know that you are loved. . . We all need friends.”

On co-parenting with a jerk – “If you teach a child that their father is bad then they may very well think that since they are his child they, too, are bad. It’s a thin line to walk but trying to turn a child against one of the parents is like beating your ex over the head with your child as a weapon. Being an ex-wife is not easy and I was determined that she was not going to be an ex-child.”

On overcoming rock bottom – “I’m living proof that your past does not have to determine your present, or your future, for that matter. If you feel like nothing, that means you have the freedom to be anything you want to be. As I always say, if a naive thirteen-year-old girl could elope with her famous second cousin, and survive all of the tragedy and trouble that wrought, you can survive your dumbass decisions, too.”

On forgiveness – “I’ve realized that forgiveness isn’t for the other person, it’s for yourself. You do it so that you can move on with your life, no longer giving that other person one iota of space in your thoughts or actions. . . . I suppose for people who like to control others, that’s hard to accept. If you’re the one who’s been manipulating others, driven them away and still trying to yank their chain and they’re just not even letting themselves be connected to that chain anymore, it would seem a rude awakening.”

On the edge of despair (Myra lost a child to drowning and was very abused by Jerry Lee Lewis) – “It was as if Myra the girl melted away into that cold, damp earth and a grown woman slipped into the body that was left behind. . . . I know that psychiatrists would probably say I’m nuts, or at the very least it was a natural maturing of my ability to cope. They would be wrong. This body was now home to a new person. I suspect there are lots of people who know what I mean. Anybody who has been to that edge of desperation and despair, and somehow got back up to carry on with life, might have a sense of having died and been reborn. . . . . It was the new me who breathed the fresh morning air and knew that life must go on.”

I am a firm believer that many perspectives give you a whole perspective. I have never limited myself to where I find my treasure of wisdom. I seek wisdom everywhere. In my experience, some of the most profound gleaming gems of real truth, have come from the least likely of sources. Down-home wisdom is often the best.

My Decision

“I get to decide who I am.” – Rachel Hollis

A younger friend of mine enthusiastically recommended the book Girl, Wash Your Face by Rachel Hollis. It’s an inspiring, upbeat book, written by a real-life, 30-something, successful mother, wife and entrepreneur. It’s a fun, easy, earthy read that I think my younger self would have appreciated even more. Still, I found myself writing the above quote in my inspirational notebook. It is strange to be almost 50 and to still feel the need to remind myself of that fact, from time to time. I get to decide who I am. It’s an empowering mantra.

I think that we women, especially, work so hard to please the “others” in our lives, that we sometimes lose ourselves in the process. We let other people’s definitions of what the perfect wife, mother, friend, daughter, daughter-in-law, girlfriend, niece, co-worker, boss, sister, spiritual follower, cousin, teacher, customer, volunteer, etc. etc. lead us into who we think we SHOULD be. We then drive ourselves bananas, being our own hardest task masters, trying to live up to these definitions of perfection that aren’t even necessarily our own visions and definitions of the “perfect woman.”

I think it is a worthwhile reminder for all us to consider from time to time. “I get to decide who I am.” Is what I am doing right now in my life my decision? Am I being the person who I know myself to be to the deepest core of my being? Am I living up to my standards for what I want in my life? Am I abusing myself by trying to live up to impossible standards set up by society – standards that don’t gel with who I really am or what I really want in life? Am I letting other people decide who I am?

I get to decide who I am. What an empowering mantra!

“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.” 
― Bernard M. Baruch

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” 
― Ralph Waldo Emerson