We were building a new fire pit in our backyard last week and decided to line the area with clam shells. It was my job to drive to the place where I thought they sold them and get a price. I went to the place and found no one in the office. It was locked with a sign saying you have to drive down to the scale house. (I figured that’s where they weighed the trucks.) I drive my brand new car car down the dirt path with dust billowing all around me. The further down the path I got, the more I was surrounded by huge dump trucks making me feel very small in my little Honda. Soon I realized this wasn’t working and I drove back up to the office. The dump truck drivers smiled and waved like I belonged there. I reached the office and parked. I got out and read all the signs on the doors. Nothing. No one. I got back in the car a bit dejected. I wanted those clamshells. This fire pit was going to happen. Not only was it going to happen, but it WAS going to happen the way I envisioned it in my mind. I looked up and saw a landscaping company right across the road. Maybe they’ll know where I can buy clamshells. I drove over, parked, and went in to make my inquiry. When I asked the young man behind the counter if he knew where I could buy clamshells, he said, “Yes, from me.” Within minutes I had my price and delivery date. Mission accomplished. I figured it out.
This month of June is filled with graduations and moving up ceremonies of all types from pre-school to college and parents across the country are watching one era of their child’s life end and another begin. There’s that fear of sending them off on the bus to kindergarten. The terror of them entering middle or high school. Then there’s the empty house after you’ve deposited them in a college dorm. After college, there’s real life.
At every stage it’s a mothers instinct to just rush in and decide everything for them. Plan their life. Tell them what sports to play, what career path to choose, who to live with, or not. Moms just want to push themselves into their children’s lives by doing all of these things, not to control them. Not to take away their independence. None of that. It’s out of love. A mother always wants to make their child’s world easier and smoother because they love their child so much.
But we moms must hold back. We must provide the opportunity for them to decide for themselves who to befriend, which college to go to, what career path to pursue. Just as I had to figure out how to get those clamshells, they have to figure out life – the little things – on a daily basis. For its the little things that they struggle to figure out, the little choices they make everyday, that, in time, create the big picture. The tapestry of their lives.
And so, as another day goes by, all of you moms moving your children to the next phase of life, all of us moms, parents of adult children, take comfort – they’ll figure it out, and …I have written.
Leave a Reply