Mile Markers

I started this blog at the beginning of the school year and now here we are at the end of the year. The time has zipped past, just as I knew it would but prayed it wouldn't. My oldest son finished his exams yesterday and is now done with school with the exception of graduation next week. I have such a mass of emotions going on, there's not enough room in my head. I am walking around with a lump in my throat, bordering on crying at the drop of a hat, though I haven't yet. Everything reminds me that my little boy has grown up and is getting ready to leave the nest. I am happy, excited and sad at the same time. It's weird because in one sense, we've come to the end of a long trip, and yet the journey has really only begun.

If I have done my job as a parent, he should be chomping at the bit and ready to go, yet in a weak moment, I am willing him to want to stay here and be my little boy for a little longer. Oh, who am I trying to kid? He hasn't been my "little" anything for quite a while. He's been a boy in a man's body since middle school and has needed me less and less. (Except for maybe food, and clean laundry, and lunch money, and now gas money.)

I tend to think of my kids as a team, and for all these years, he has been their (reluctant) leader. He is a very big gear in this family machine and I can't quite imagine us running the same without him around. His gentle touch with the smaller siblings, the shared inside jokes with the older ones, his intelligent, humorous insights into everyday life that always make me smile are just some of the things I will miss. It breaks my heart that my one-year-old son will always view his oldest brother as a "visitor", not having the benefit of his everyday presence as his older brothers and sisters did. Indeed, number 2 daughter learned very early that if she called his name from the crib in the mornings, he was much quicker to "rescue her" than Mom and Dad were.

I have had him around the house for a couple of days already and he prefers to stay in his room and work on the computer or play video games but I have actually tried to get him out of the house a bit by having him drive his sisters to school and pick up his brother from preschool. I imagine he thinks it is a nuisance, but I think of it as making memories.

This next week is going to be a tough one. When the finality of graduation becomes real, I feel like I am going to cry a river. I know I am not the first mom to ever go through this, my mom had four kids and her oldest went from high school directly into the Navy during Vietnam. My kid is going off to a small private university and will be a mere four hours away and what with cell phones and video chatting on the computer, it won't be that bad.... right? At least I am blessed with six other "babies" to keep me busy and give me extra hugs and kisses when I need them most.