and.....she's off!

babygirl age four

I am the mother of a high school student. I am the mother of a high school student. I am the mother of a high school student?  Are you kidding me with this? In my mind, I AM the high school student. How is it possible this day has come? Better question: How is it possible I've accepted all the signs? Let's start with my wrinkles (you know I LOVE to speak of my wrinkles!), the fact that I finally started to color my hair and the best post 40 wake up call: it takes so long to lose weight and even longer to take it off and it takes Herculean discipline to stay fit - but one Oreo? ONE EFFIN Oreo? Right to my thighs. May as well rub those little cookies all over my backside because that's exactly where they land.

All the signs are present as I (kind of) gracefully pass through time, laughing at said signs and living the days go by. But the tangibility of my first born entering High School is sobering. Exciting. Terrifying. I feel like this is the start of something big, massive and lightning quick. Like a canon is ready to be shot and in four short years, my babygirl will be ready to leave me. She will leave me. She will leave me.

As a rational gal, I know I am raising her to do just that. To leave me and successfully live on her own. Making her own mistakes, her own successes independent of her Mama (sorry, I'm watching a lot of Friday Night Lights and I'm stuck with some Texan twang.)  I know this, I pray for it and somedays I long for the solitude of an empty nest. 

It's the beginnings and the endings that throw me. The ending of a life, the beginning of a career, the ending of a friendship. It seems like the doing, the living, with all it's ups and downs and laughs and grumbles goes on moment for moment. These transitions though always give me pause to reflect. 


I watch as younger Mamas around me send their babies to Kindergarten or Middle School for the first time. I smile and tell them all will be well. Thank God they CAN reach these milestones. Don't mourn the past, be grateful for it and embrace the future. And some older Mamas look at me and say the same thing. I will say I mourn nothing in the past, but I am kinda frightened of the future. For the first time in a long time I feel like all my parenting skills will be put to the test. 

me and babygirl this summer

Will she have friends? Will her grades be good enough? Will she get in a car with someone whose drinking? Will she smoke pot? I don't know any of these answers. Worse in not knowing? I have no control over the outcome. While I am certainly not done raising my kids, glimpses of real life are here and I hope and pray the kids will take the tools I've given them and use them in the best way they can to make good decisions. I know sometimes they won't. I pray most times they will. I hope that when they are about to make a choice that could lead to severe consequences, they'll hear my words and see my face. I hope they make choices knowing what could happen. And I pray when they make mistakes, I'll have the grace to guide them through, without anger and judgement. That's a big prayer, yes? 

Somewhere in the back of my mind I know all will be well. I smile and look forward to hearing about the good and the nasty and all that comes with it. The kisses, the sneaking around, all of it. Come on, it's going to happen. I just hope and pray it happens as safely as possible. And I hope that the high schooler that lives in me will tell my wrinkled middle aged self to relax and have an Oreo. Or four...