It was a nice trip in its own way, but so emotional.  The car was crammed to the roof all the way down to Washington.  Once we unloaded at his new apartment the car felt huge and empty, rather like the house feels now.  The place itself is very tidy and charming, and his roommates seem personable and welcoming.  The neighborhoods between his home and his work are a little....let's call them "quaint"...but he'll learn how to maneuver, and which streets are safe to travel and which aren't.

It feels so strange to talk about "his home" when it is so very far away from here.  This will always be his home to me, I suppose, at least until he meets someone and starts a "home" of his own.  But school is behind Son Number One for the moment, and the Real World Job starts on Monday.  He will blow them away with his intelligence and his charm and his affability.  Washington will be a great place for him to strut his stuff.  I think he's a little nervous about the whole venture, but I predict that within a week he'll feel as though he's been there all his life.

I am so grateful to live in the age of cell phones and text messages and Face Book.  It makes him feel nearer, and for a while I'm going to need that illusion.  It's a new phase for all of us, and I need to figure out how my end of things works.  I'm free to audition for more plays or take a class or (hah!) start an exercise program.  It's a little scary for me, too.  But we are both going to rock this.  And I'm counting the days until Thanksgiving!  But until then, go get 'em, Chief.  It's a whole new day and the world needs what you have to give!

Doors are magical.  Every day we open our front door onto another surprise.  Sometimes it's snowstorms that change our perceptions of the world we live in, sometimes hedges defiantly peeping through piles of ice and dirt, and one of these days (please, God) a crocus or tulip.  We open the door to strangers selling things, to friends visiting, to our sons coming home for visits. When I was sick recently I opened my door and found a bag of chicken soup and treats and tea from a loving friend.  Even the mail is an adventure if you look at it the right way.

Sometimes I'm not going out.  I'm coming in.  Reactions can be "Ugh, I have GOT to clean this place before they film a Febreze commercial in here!" or "Ahhhh.  Home."  If someone is there to greet me the energy is different.  If it's my husband we putter and do our separate things in companionable silence sometimes, or chatter about our days.  Eventually we'll sit on the reclining couch to watch something (anything) on the TV and one or both of us will nod off to sleep half way through.  If the boys are home they are coming or going with friends or without, but sometimes they actually stay put for a bit and talk to us and play a board game or share a meal.  I memorize those moments, realizing that they, like the snow, are disappearing quickly.  When I open the door and there is no answer to my call, the emptiness is always a disappointment.  This is one of the reasons my house is not tidy.  I hate being there alone for any length of time.  Well, that and the fact that I don't like housework.

Then there's the Big Door at the end of our lives, the one through which we walk alone.  Who knows what surprises lie beyond that door?  I find that door is ajar sometimes.  There are times when my heart drifts through to get a look at what's coming up.  It stopped scaring me a long time ago, maybe because I have so many people I've loved who have joined my "Advance Team" and gone through first.  Other times I swear I feel the presence of those wonderful friends and family members who "visit" at the most unpredictable times.  I'll hear a song that I just KNOW is a message.  A car will miss hitting me by two coats of paint and I know I'm being watched over.  The connection is still there.  The love doesn't disappear just because it can't be expressed in a hug at the moment.  Any more than the world disappears when I close my front door.

It was bound to happen.  I knew it the first time he picked up a rugby ball.  Yesterday a knee to the face resulted in a broken nose for my college senior, who has avoided serious injury (at least that he informed me about) up until now.  Luckily in this age of technology, even for Luddites like myself, Son Number One was able to comfort me long distance with a "selfie" which really didn't look all that bad.  I suspect that today there will be panda eyes and more swelling, but at least he went to the emergency room for treatment so he's been seen by someone who knows significantly more about broken noses than I, with my fairly useless degree in French.  To tell you the truth, that nose which started out like a tiny button all those years ago, has been looking a little "askew" for a while; not obvious, but just the tiniest bit crooked.  Mother is suspecting that this might be her baby's second broken nose, but who can tell?

The trial of the long distance Mom is to stay calm and supportive and let him handle it on his own, which he is quite capable of doing.  He even used his "Talk Her Off The Ledge" voice when he phoned to assure me he was fine.  I know it could have been a far worse injury. All those prayers and guardian angels I dispatch seem to be doing the job.   My idea of winning a rugby game is empty ambulances on the edge of the field.  This is football with no padding.  This is, in my humble opinion, nuts.

And so I absorb another exercise in "letting go", a class for which I don't remember registering.  Son Number Two is in Cleveland fencing for his university.  I hope he doesn't come home with a dueling scar across his cheek.  That test I would certainly fail.

It's happening again....It's only July and already the best birds have taken off for parts unknown.  If you don't believe me, set your alarm for 4:30 and open your window.  Oh wait.  It's DARK now at 4:30.  That's almost a good thing since you can now sleep for an extra hour at least, but when you DO open that window, you'll hear a mourning dove, a crow, and maybe a sparrow.  The divas have left the building.  There is still a lot of summer to go, though, and it doesn't seem quite fair, but there we are.

Meanwhile, my own nest will soon be temporarily full again.  Son Number One flies home this Saturday from a summer internship in Washington, D.C. and will be in residence for a couple of weeks before heading back to his last year in college.  Son Number Two has been home since May and has been working at my place of employment since June, so we commute together.  OK, sometimes he sleeps going in or out of town, but often we chat about whatever is on his mind, or he'll run lines with me to help me memorize my script for the play I'm in.  It's been a joy to breathe the same air for the whole summer.  I'd forgotten how much fun he is.  I'll have him until just before Labor Day.  My mother used to call this "having all her chicken's in one roost" and it was her greatest joy.  I didn't understand what the big deal was back then.  I do now.

They'll both be back to school soon and the house will be quiet again.  And that's OK.  I'm getting better at letting the birds leave the nest.  I understand that it's their turn to fly and that soon they won't be coming "home" because they'll be making nests of their own.  To my complete astonishment I'm finding that my claws are retractable after all.  Not only do I not have to hang on for dear life, I don't really want to.  I'm enjoying watching the process and I am dazed at the talent and resourcefulness they both show.  But for the moment I am thoroughly enjoying the prospect of time with my boys.  Himself and I will have time for dinners and movies again, instead of playing chauffeur.  We'll be back to washing the dishes ourselves and taking out our own trash, and we're quite capable of doing all that and more.  But just as the quiet mornings make me sad once the birds leave, the quiet house will be bittersweet.  Silence can be good, too. And, as for the birds and the boys, as a very smart friend once told me every time I wept at his departure, "How can I come back if I don't leave?" and that was and will always be cause for celebration.

I am in such a strange mood.  Tonight is my 40th reunion from college.  At the last one of these I went to, five years ago, I thought I looked pretty good.  Then someone put up pictures on Face Book and that was the end of that delusion and the beginning of my reunion with Weight Watchers.  I'm not expecting much to be different tonight. 

I look at my sons, who are already going into their Junior and Senior years of college and I see little faces and plastic knights' helmets and Fisher Price castles with cannon balls flying. How on earth did we get here this fast?  And now I get to face the strange fact that I haven't been a college student in four decades.  A large number of these women were also classmates of mine from grade seven right through high school.  Nineteen of us went to Emmanuel in the fall of 1970 from Girls' Latin School.  Trembling with anticipation in our very first class of freshman year (English with Dr. Jerry Bernhard at 8:30AM) we all gasped when he told us our first assignment was to read "The Aeneid".  Eyes widened.  Furtive glances were stolen.  Notes were passed.  "In TRANSLATION?  ALL RIGHT!"

But that was long ago when the crust of the earth was cooling.  So much has happened since then.  There have been jobs and deaths, romances and broken hearts, children and grandchildren (not mine yet, thankfully) and 9/11 and cell phones, ATMs and iPads.  It's all new and more than a little overwhelming at times.  Yet we cope, some of us better than others.  How does one start a conversation after 40 years?  "What's new?"  Well, there's always wine.  Or I could stuff my face with cheese and crackers and feign a migraine.  At least we're not quite at the age when we don't drive at night.  Or at least I hope that's true.  You never know.  I may be in for another shattered delusion.

Then tomorrow my older college boy goes off to Washington, D.C. for the summer to serve an internship with our Congressman.  This is the very first summer of his life when he won't be home with me.  Oh I know the days are numbered anyway.  His life is taking off like a rocket, as is his brother's.  They have their friends, their own interests, and this coming year, their own apartments instead of living on campus.  I realize they may never really move home again, and that's fine.  But you'll forgive me if there is a tiny bit of mourning going on.  I don't feel needed any longer, and that is as it should be if I have done my job well.  But this letting go thing is so much harder than Virgil's "Aeneid" in Latin or in English.

It's the morning after the first major snowstorm of the season in New England.  Luckily, it's Sunday, so most people have the luxury of being off the roads, which will give the towns the ability to have the roads in passable shape before very long.  What would paralyze Washington, D.C. for a week we turn around in hours.  Normally I do not like to awaken to the sound of heavy machinery, but after a storm the scrape of the plow blade outside my window is welcome music and somehow cozy.

Christmas shoppers are likely having fits at the inconvenience, but I am perfectly happy to sit here at nearly ten in the morning and contemplate what kind of eggs I feel like making.  There will be a fire in the fireplace soon because on most days we are never home to enjoy it.  Today Mother Nature has decreed that it really is time to do the decorating and list making and cocoa sipping.  No one is expecting me anywhere until four this afternoon when I will face the throngs at the mall, but as a salesperson, not a shopper.  My shopping is far from done, but I'll figure it out later.

Meanwhile, the wooden nativity set is on the mantle, and the stockings are hung.  The garlands are at least as far as the living room (although they are still in trash bags) and somewhere in here I just KNOW there is a vacuum cleaner head.  If not, I'll get the broom and worry about that later.  The coffee is perking in the kitchen, Himself gave me a good morning kiss to curl my toes, and my heart is getting ready to welcome the boys home this week.

Word came yesterday of the health problems of some very dear friends.  Monday will mean a trip to visit the hospital instead of to the store to buy what nobody needs.  People are what matter, and not just at Christmas.  My friends are all amazing, and I refer to them as my "F.B.C." or "Family By Choice".  Sometimes it takes a snowy day, some enforced "down time", and a bit of scary news to remind me of that.  I raise my cup of cocoa to you all.  Blessings on you!

I've been up since 4:30 this morning listening to the wind howl.  Son Number Two is flying home for Thanksgiving this morning in the middle of rain, wind, and thunder.  I've come to expect this.  There is never a trip to or from Ohio that is not fraught with peril.  If it isn't weather it's a missed connection.  If it isn't either of those it's the flu.  One way or another, that poor kid never catches a break.

He is a charmer, really.  He has a great smile, and a kind heart.  What he has done to annoy the Powers That Be is a complete mystery to me, but somewhere along the way he must have set them off.  I have a few days off from both jobs and will spend the weekend doing singing "gigs", four Masses, two funerals, and a Christmas tree lighting between now and Tuesday.  This is fun, and my preferred way to make money, although it won't pay the mortgage yet.  The best part is that it puts me (except for the tree lighting) in a place where I can dump my problem in God's lap and hope S/He doesn't stand up.  On second thought, I can (and do) do just that no matter where I am, but you know what I mean.

I once read, and I believe, that once you have a child it's like wearing your heart on the outside of your body for the rest of your life.  The vulnerability is painful.  There isn't a blessed thing I can do to protect them anymore except pray, and I do that, but I hold my breath until they are tucked into their beds, even if it's only while passing through from one place to another.  A dear friend from Wales has arrived bringing photos and gifts and memories of my other dear friend who passed away in February and after whom we named Son Number Two.  There is a picture of SNT at the age of about four, sitting on a high stool at the counter in the kitchen in Wales and laughing hysterically at something outrageous.  I'm sure it was a fart joke.  They usually were if they got that big a laugh.  He's a physics major now and doing very well, but he still hasn't lost that sense of joy and abandon. 

So, United Airlines, you'd better take care of the Joy Boy and get him home in time for turkey because Mom needs one more thing for which to be grateful, and that will be a beaut.

I woke at 5:30 without benefit of the alarm clock, which surprised me, considering I was at the subway at midnight picking up Son Number One after his shift ended.  The room was darker than I had expected it to be.  August is like that.  Daylight leaks out of the day like tea from a cracked mug.  The windows were open because the temperatures were cool overnight and it's always nice to get fresh air in the room and not depend on the fans or air conditioners to pull it in.  And then it hit me.  All I could hear was the hum of distant traffic.  Where are my birds?  They did it to me again!  They packed their birdie bags and slipped away when I wasn't paying attention.

It wouldn't have been a tearful goodbye.  I knew it was coming.  There are still a few sparrows and the odd robin who winters over.  Not all the birds are gone.  Why do I always feel guilty that I haven't paid close enough attention to their song?  In addition to the fact that daily exercise is a promise I make and break with depressing regularity, I find myself wishing I'd gotten up early every morning and gone for a walk just for the pleasure of the symphony we have access to for such a short time each year.  There are still heat waves ahead of us, I suspect.  It's only early August, after all.  But that beautiful background music is gone for another year and I'm missing it.  This is another reminder, as if I needed one, that the boys will be going back to school in less than two weeks and the house will be neater (some) and quieter (too much).  My heart aches just a little.

Before long the windows will be closed overnight and the traffic hum will be less noticeable, then there will be autumn winds, followed by snow, and before you know it, robin song again, because life goes by about that fast.  Next time I'll pay closer attention.  And maybe I'll stare at leaves and snowflakes a little closer this year, too.  But I'm already longing for spring.

It's been "One Of Those Weeks".  I've worked the office job from 10 to 3 Monday through Friday (after working at the boutique on Sunday) and then Thursday and Friday nights I worked at the boutique until 10.  Saturday I worked from 11 to 3:30, and today it's 2 to 7.  Son Number One's girlfriend arrived (love her!) on Saturday morning at 1AM and I am, quite frankly, a tad fatigued.  The grass is almost peeking in at the window sill and sobbing for attention.  It will wait a few hours, I'm sure.  Plantar fasciitis is tuning up for a symphony in my left heel.  For right now I am enjoying sitting still.  The torrential rains have left, and this Sunday morning the windows are open for a cool breeze and birdsong to start my day.  There is a book at my elbow which is singing its siren song, to which I have every intention of succumbing.  Give me a hot cup of tea and I shall rule the world.
I don't know what I did during the fourteen years I was lucky enough to be at home with my children.  It certainly wasn't housework.  They had their music lessons and sports, karate black belts and play dates.  My universe revolved around their schedules and that was our choice and our privilege.  Most people don't have the option of walking out on their careers and taking an orchestra seat at life.  Getting back into it (not a "career", but a "job") has been challenging.
So much of how we define ourselves involves how we make money.  At a party, when approached by a stranger and asked "Who are you?" the answer often is "I'm a doctor" or "I work in computers" or "I'm a cashier at Walmart and a pole dancer on weekends".  I was stuck for an answer for a while, feeling a little guilty that my life was mostly driving the car and making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  There was the embarrassment of not making a paycheck, but also an embarrassment of riches.  I had time with my children.  My friend Flanagan (whom I miss with a white hot heat) would call many days and be the only adult I spoke to between the hours of 8AM and 7PM.  He would chide me to "Be a human being, not a human doing!" and remind me of how blessed I was to be in my situation.  He would repeat the importance of the airline safety drill of "putting on your own oxygen mask before trying to take care of everyone else".
While the children were in school I would visit with retired friends, and eventually, with my mother in her last years at the nursing home.  I was free to spoon feed her lunch and amuse her cohorts with a song or a borderline-appropriate joke or two.  I got to learn what really mattered.  After a year of emptying out my routines, children off to college, Mother and Flanagan and Webb passing away to where they don't need me, I'm filling up my life with other things.  But I have learned to appreciate the sheer luxury of sitting with a hot cup of tea and counting my blessings.  And on this sunny, bird-filled day, I gently remind you to stop and do the same.

The need to "parent" never ends.  After the usual snowstorm/airport fiasco which I've come to expect when Son #2 comes home, and having received the 3AM phone call from Son #1 who had safely landed in Seattle, I toddled downstairs and woke Son #2 from the couch and made him go upstairs to brush his teeth, wash his face, put his precious head on a newly laundered pillowcase and go to sleep.  I was feeling a little silly about this until the phone rang at 6:45 this morning and my 82 year-old father-in-law called to warn me (age 60) that I should be careful of the ice on the front stairs.

We all need to feel that our children need us.  Or that somebody needs us.  Otherwise all the mani-pedis and massages and book clubs become pointless.  Of course, it's important to take good care of and to occasionally pamper ourselves.  We deserve that, and it's good for the ego and the body and the nerves.  But I feel so much better after I've called a mourning friend and been able to make her laugh just for a moment, or shot an e-mail to a friend battling cancer to remind her that I'm praying and that she's not facing the day-to-day battle alone.  I don't think it's ego.  I think it's an awareness that we've got a job to do while we're here.  We all fall down at different points of our lives.  Our friends (and sometimes wonderful angel strangers) are usually there to pick us up.  When they fall we pick them up.  Eventually we help one another get to the other side.
As long as we don't all have our breakdowns on the same day, the system usually works, and I find it satisfying to be reminded once in a while that even though my babies are not babies any more, someone is still glad that I'm there to reach out a hand.  And I'm glad I have someone to remind me to hold the railing when the stairs are icy, even if I might have figured it out on my own.