Do you remember the children’s book Very First Last Time? It was a favorite of ours when my kids were small. We read it aloud quite often. I’ve been thinking about that book the last few days. The storyline goes like this: Eva, an Inuit girl, lives along Ungava Bay in northern Canada. In the winter, her people search for mussels along the bottom of the seabed. Although Eva has often joined her mother on these searches, today is the very first day she’s climbing down through the ice hole by herself.
My very first last time is not as dramatic as Eva’s, it’s just pretty emotional. Last week I paid the last tuition to the co-op for the class my youngest son is taking. The countdown has begun. Oh the phases of parenting.
The countdown technically began 24 years ago, when my first child was born. Life is a series of events and situations that you go through. Some good, some not so much, but each day brings new things to deal with.
We homeschooled all three of our kids, all through their schooling years. My oldest two have graduated and moved on to other things. My youngest will graduate high school in a few short weeks. The co-op all three of my kids attended has provided many fulfilling classes, events and relationships along the way for each of them, myself included, and that is coming to an end.
I knew this day was coming. I even wrote a post about it, Back to (Home) School, at the beginning of the school year. I just didn’t think it would get here so fast. And yet…it did.
This is a bittersweet time, it really is. I am excited that I will no longer be in charge of my kids’ formal education. I’m excited too, for the new things that are opening up for my child, and looking forward to the ones he will choose, watching him grow and change all the while. But on the other hand, it is over. My kids are grown. My baby is no longer a baby, nor has he been for many years.
I’m a sentimental old fool, in case you haven’t noticed. I countdown every milestone that comes our way. This one’s been a long time in the making but it is finally upon us.
I will embrace it for what it is…this very first last time.
I remember thinking that as a kid – the very first last time I opened a school locker or attended a class or took a test. Well, that’s what I thought. You can do all of those things in adulthood too.
I never looked at it from my parent’s point of view until I became a parent. Now I’m haunted by how happy I was to go to college, and how my mom must have felt.
Ugh. My tender heart.
Yeah, kinda different being on this side, huh?
I remember thinking that as a kid – the very first last time I opened a school locker or attended a class or took a test. Well, that’s what I thought. You can do all of those things in adulthood too.
I never looked at it from my parent’s point of view until I became a parent. Now I’m haunted by how happy I was to go to college, and how my mom must have felt.
Ugh. My tender heart.
Yeah, kinda different being on this side, huh?
I did the same as your last post. I would think, this is the end of this class and I will never be here, etc. Then I did it as my girls grew up. We also homeschooled and were very close. College for my first one was not too hard; she lived at home. But it was hard when she left and moved into her apartment. My second daughter moved out and near ULs campus within two weeks. We went from a family of five to a family of three. I would repeatedly leave the door unlocked before I realized no one was coming home. When my youngest went to college, she went about three hours away. I rode with her and my husband drove the van. As we got into the car, she said,”what have I gotten into?” And I thought the same! I kept my promise not to cry in her dorm room, but as soon as we hit the stairs, I sobbed. All three hours home, my husband talked about all three girls, as this was the end of an era. One of us would say ” do you remember when…” And we would both start crying. We cried all the way home! We are about as sentimental as they come!
Laurie, I did not expect to write so long, but now that I have I may turn it into a post on my website in the fall. Is that bad blogger etiquette? I am with you in spirit as you process these changes.
I think it is a great idea for a post. I’ve used my comments on other’s post as a catalyst for writing one of my own. Sometimes I reference the post and sometimes I don’t. Thanks for you support.
Beautiful post, Laurie. Brings back memories.
Aww…thanks Betty, Always means a lot coming from an author like you. 🙂
Samuel turned thirteen yesterday. I was so aware of his last day as a preteen. It seems so impossible. My eldest, meanwhile, just finished her undergraduate career. We head back east for her graduation in a week. My heart is just so filled with all of these lasts and firsts and everything in between!!
Loved visiting you today!
That’s crazy right? Time seems to go faster and faster.