I learned this week that my youngest son has surpassed me in height. This guy spends his time in seclusion - for that is the phase he is in. I know he will come back to me and when he does, well, he will have forever left Tooker behind. Both my children now look down to me and, honestly, nothing could have prepared me for the feeling that accompanies that knowledge. Forever gone. Forever independent of mother. I knew, of course, it would happen one day. I knew it, but, I didn't know the hug your child gives you from above is like receiving comfort rather than giving comfort. That transition, well, it feels like permanency, and it feels like I didn't get the opportunity to celebrate the last moment I was the giver. It bowled me over. Literally. It will now be, "I'm hugging my mom because that is what a good son does. I'm hugging my mom because she needs my reassurance that she is still treasured."
My oldest son caught me as I feel off his skateboard this week. HE caught ME. The baby with the million dollar smile is now a man child, trying to share his passion with me, and when I fail, he is catching me. He and I spent hours this week talking about about a variety of topics. I listened to him and thought, "It is so strange to talk to your child like an upcoming equal. He has his own thoughts, feelings, instincts, drive, conceived notions. When did it all happen?"
All this Texas time I feel stuck in a time/space continuum, as though I have not come from anywhere, nor am I going anywhere. I feel almost entirely separate from my own life and then there are this intense moments in which I feel like this Texas time has catapulted me too far into my future. It's too much. It's too fast. I'm not ready. And so this cloud has settled in which I have tried to recall every childish voice, mannerism and story. I looked at the past and the present and spent time trying to marry the two in my mind.
And so, dear reader, I have spent the last two days trying to refill my love bucket. The bucket that my husband knows, and likes to say, is so large, maybe larger than most. (Simply meaning, I have a lot to give but I need a lot poured back in. It's a big four lane highway.) Between work and the stresses of the winter storm, and the personal losses of the last couple weeks, I feel my soul laid low and bare. I read a book in it's entirety - 564 pages - in one day. I ate silver dollar pancakes, which are my favorite, and which Ryan made just for me. Does anyone really like pancakes that are as big as a plate? I submit they just don't taste as good. He knows food is the way to my heart; I am pretty girly but I also have some man tendencies, and that is one. Ryan also got our old lava lamp working and it was comforting to watch it swirl and glob and blob; it reminds me of my childhood.
I continue to wonder how the settling will be. When will I feel it? When will it be complete? This disconnect seems foreign. Is it completely new or have I just forgotten how lost you become? I guess maybe what I forgot is every move has been its own phase of child rearing. It has compounded the issues and this phase is the one in which I let my children go. It is compounding the feelings of loss, and increasing the feelings of instability.
I didn't count on that. A marked flaw in the master plan.
What if I still lived in NY? What would it look like? What would I be doing? Would I be happy? Would my kids be happy? Or would we all be longing for a change we didn't know we needed?
Please, Jesus, send a sign that we are in the right place. Send us some old friends that take forever to grow. Or, help us to watch the green leaves falling to the earth like snow, in February, with an appreciation of the deep smells of late spring.
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