The Space Between

A crew mom from Charlie’s high school asked me for pictures from last year's end-of-year celebrations so that she can replicate some of the traditions we had. I was anxious to check through these emails so I could cross things off my growing list. But as I scrolled through old pictures, I got caught in a net of memories, people and places and smiles I’ll never forget, of Charlie’s days of high school rowing, which weren’t that long ago. Looking at his bright face through rowing, and prom and graduation, his seventh-grade awards ceremony, his third-grade class trip, then suddenly sitting in his college sweatshirt, not knowing yet what the future holds. How can this be? How can this moment have gotten here so fast? It still seems impossible to think that he is off to college. I just can’t help but see him as the little kid I relentlessly hugged without thinking, the little guy who ran around the yard chasing his older brothers and sister, the youngest and the easiest in so many ways. The pictures take me on a trip down memory lane, and really those are the pictures I hold in my heart: that little boy with chubby cheeks, a big smile and bright blue eyes. Now when we FaceTime, I have to pause and catch my heart up to the young man he is and the way he has grown since the last time we talked. I just have to look and wonder about who this handsome new guy is on my little screen. Can that be my Charlie? When we talk, we are always redefining the relationship and the parameters of what I should know and what I can't know. I ask too many questions. He told me that already. Don’t I remember? I have to tread lightly. When he gets home, I’ll go slowly. I’ll respond instead of investigating. Maybe he’ll let me take a few pictures.

For Annie though, this year is very different. College graduation. For all the writing I do about Letting Go and Leaving, and I’ve Got This, I don’t know one damn thing. I’m in denial. I. Can. Not. Believe. It. It is hard to quantify or qualify something you’ve never been through before. Even though Jay graduated and is off on his own, it’s different and it hits differently. How is it possible that my little girl is a college graduate? When they were off to college, it always felt to me that they were coming home eventually. Christmas, Spring Break, Summers. They would sleep in their beds again. They would eat the cereal again. They would do their laundry again. Now those days are limited. It still hasn’t sunk in fully. Each day brings me closer to the day they will actually leave.  Maybe when they leave the nest, it’s a bit like grief. I am going through the stages of leaving and going through the motions to learn to cope. One strategy: hope that they’ll come back. Back for Christmas. Back for summer vacation. Back Home. Soon though, they’ll have their own home, a new one away from us, away from Home.

Annie sent me a song the other day called, “Thought You Should Know.” Ugh. If you haven’t listened to it, grab tissues. “Those prayers you thought you wasted on me must’ve finally made their way on through…”  It’s by Morgan Wallen. I can’t believe she’s sending me this stuff! If she only knew how many, many, many prayers were said for her, all through her life. She should be my little girl again! I know that’s not true but that’s what my heart wants. Or at least part of my heart. Logically, I know we can’t go back, but just a glimpse of that little girl brings me such joy. It's the pictures in my mind that pull me back... Her toothless grin, her singing karaoke, her riding a horse, her holding her baby brother, her going to prom, her driving to school, her teaching a class. And a glimpse of the young woman she is brings me joy too. And of course, all she has yet to be! It doesn’t make sense at all, but that’s what it is. It’s like being in the fun house, with mirrors all around and you don’t know which image to look at. You can’t tell where to go, and yet you have glimpses of where you’ve been and teases of visions of where you can’t get to. No wonder it’s so hard.

I’ve been reading a lot about Liminal Space in Richard Rohr’s writing. The space between. The threshold. The doorway. We are all in this wide doorway to the next steps. How do we hold on to what is in the past, with all the love that conjures for us? How do we soak up the present and make each moment count? How do we let go enough to make room for the more love that’s coming? It feels impossible. 

The heart may have 4 ventricles, but I think there are 3 when it comes to our kids. The heart that belongs to when they were little, the heart that belongs to this moment, and the heart that is filled with dreams and hopes for them and their future. Every beat is for them: Longing for the past, love for the now, hope for what is to come. The past sucks us, willingly, back in time. We remember and we smile. Then the present, where we try to treasure and savor every moment. And the future, when and where will it take them? Suzanne Stabile of The Enneagram Journey says that Maturity is holding a place for all three, present, past, and future, and being willing to stand in that liminal space. Sounds good. As much as there's a part of me that doesn't want my children to grow up, I don't want to grow up either, not if maturity means I can't go back in time.

In our decorations for her graduation, we put up pictures of Annie’s life on the living room mantel, all the way back to when she was born. Even in that way, we bring the past with us. These baby pictures sit next to her diploma, her present, and next to that, gifts for her new apartment. So we are holding space for all three moments in time, past, present, and future. I wish our hearts could hold all three as easily. I wish our minds could too. Wherever you are in your seasons of children, I hope you are finding a way to hold all three.