Fare thee well April! I kicked your butt and took at least one name.

--> Hello Goodbye April!!  <--

Only two weeks until Ky is home for the summer (ack!!!!) and, combined with the end of April, I’m feeling quite reflective today. Sometimes when I’m involved in working really hard for something and I haven’t QUITE made it a reality just yet, I feel like I’ve gotten nowhere. If that brass ring isn’t in my hand, I see it as a failure, regardless of how many inches closer to it I am this month than I was the one before.

To get away from this I’m going to try to remind myself of all the things I’ve pushed forward this month – even things that didn’t pan out perfectly (the 9999 ways to not make a lightbulb and all that…).

Left the least favorite of my two jobs! This has to get top billing.

• Actually FINISHED, with excellent work ethic and grim determination – in a series of 60 hour work weeks – the work I had left at the least favorite job. Omg. Done.
  
  
• Was offered enough solid work in my second job to take me through December in relative comfort! Woohoo!
  
  
• Didn’t let the HUGE rejection I received to a program I’d been pretty much counting on get me down for long…
  
  
• …but instead turned it into a different sort of opportunity that seems to be suiting my mind, my finances and my schedule even better than an acceptance might have.
  
  
• Scheduled time with my old career transition coach for a tune up.
  
  
• Registered for a super cool class this summer!
  
  
• Reached out to (let me check) 12 different organizations that could move me forward in my (new, wannabe) field.
  
  
• … and got positive feedback and even some offers from 3 of them (1 is especially exciting!)
  
  
• Did a Tough Mudder --> Survived!!!!
  
  
• Made a Mindmap of all of the intricate plans, thoughts, ideas and different potential avenues for the next 6 months of my life, all based on my core values.
  
  
• Woke myself up in the middle of the night to write an email I had been dreading – I think I’m glad I did this.
• Spent twice as much time with friends as I ever have – I know I’m glad I did this!
  
  
• Put together all of my thoughts about getting myself career transition coached, and blogged about it.
  
  
• Really took the time to connect to my child, my students, my family members and my friends  - without distraction or impatience.
  
  
• Wrote 6 professional applications including the neverending coverletters, statements, philosophies and specific relevant experience descriptions – this is roughly equivalent to a full 40 hour work week in terms of man hours!
  
  
• Ran 173 miles and enjoyed about 150 of them completely!
  
  
• (listened to Harry Potter Audiobooks 1.3.4.5.and 6 – does this count????)
  
  

Actually there’s even more than this but I’m kind of shocked ----- I DID all of this in April?

Yup. (back pats all around)!

Empty nesting milestone: the first summer home

 

Whoa, can that be right? It’s nearly the end of April and fast approaching Spring semester finals week, which means the end of the academic year is right around the corner. And college students everywhere, steeped in independence and friends and dorm life and cafeteria eating, will beeline to their childhood bedrooms and parents’ presence and healthy fridges filled with a finite amount of non-magically-appearing food.

 

--> Truth be told, I’m a little nervous.

 

Out of necessity, I’ve developed a load of child-free routines for myself.

• working as late as I want without guilt
• spending $40 a week on produce and coffee and olives and eggs, and $0 a week on microwave popcorn, mac-n-cheese and cereal
• being okay with an empty fridge because I haven’t had time to shop and living off the last of the dozen eggs for three days straight (yikes, but this has happened more than once…)
• using the dining-room table as a home office (hello tax forms that I haven’t cleared away yet!)
• filling in my free hours with running, running and more running
• …and working out after work, even if that means I don’t get home until 9pm
• …and going for long walks along the water front late at night when I need to think through the problems of my day with fresh (freezing) air blowing in my face and a stretch of sidewalk to stride along

And of course Ky has developed a lot of mom-free routines, many of which I’m sure will be a surprise to me this summer. 

• eating unhealthy food at will (I know this one already)
• ??? activities at ??? late hours
• ????
• ????
• (realizing that for all our talking, I’m not exactly sure WHAT these new routines are)

I’m nervous about the two of us – once so melded and in sync – trying to work our new [empty nest (me) / college student (Ky)] selves into a cohesive family unit again.

I’m nervous that I’ve been compartmentalizing since Ky has been gone, and when we’re a family unit again I’ll realize how much I miss being a Mom with a growing chick in my nest, and it will be even harder to let my child go next year.

I’m also a little nervous of the opposite: that I’ve grown so used to my single routine, having another person in the house who needs attention and time and effort will require a lot of effort I’m no longer used to giving.

--> I am also soooooo excited!

Half of my professional life operates on an academic calendar. This means that (aside from 8 million other plans) I will have more freedom in my summer than I ever have before!

I’m thinking: camping and traveling and long walks and talks on the beach, road trips and “car food” and sunshine and shorts, swimming and biking, campfires and things toasted on long sticks, “what’s that noise? are there bears here?” middle of the night paranoia, visiting grandparents and finding people to watch the cats while we’re away, wondering if this is the year we should install a window air conditioner and not making a decision before the weather turns cool again and putting the idea off until next year… again… half marathons and tourist traffic and sand in the car and citronella candles and outdoor concerts and wind whistling through the screens at night. Family. Life. Memories. Togetherness.

I can’t wait. :)

Empty nesting milestone: out of the trenches

Having Ky leave on the bus to head back to college was, as anticipated, pretty hard. I'd gotten used to being in my role of Mom to a teenager again and it's the role I think I've loved the most in parenting. I know, every stage (except age 3) was "my favorite" and that hasn't changed over the years. I still think each year is my favorite.

But I've never felt like an especially natural, wonderful mother. At least not compared to those who post every triumphant and perfect moment on blogs. As a single mother, I never really knew if I was doing it right. I didn't have a partner to bounce things off of, and I never had the chance to take a time out to reconsider or observe things with any perspective except "in the trenches."

But parenting Ky as a teenager has always felt really good, really natural and right. I felt like maybe 8 times out of 10 I really was making the right choices, saying somewhere in the neighborhood of the right things. And for me, who was never a 10/10, hit-it-out-of-the-park-each-time mother, 8/10 felt like HUGE success. Near perfection at times!

So yeah. Watching my teen stumble onto the bus with a raft of other teens going back to college, in their new Christmas boots and North Face jackets, dragging skis and kicking backpacks and duffles along the filthy bus station floor as they texted furiously and drowned out the bus driver's announcements with shiny looking Beats that cost more than the Frye boots I splurged on for my birthday. Ky in 4 year old Doc Martins and LL Bean coat and a fuzzy blanket wrapped over shoulders like a long trailing cape.

The drive home for me filled with exhaustion, sadness, missing Ky already, looking forward in some small way to having the house and my time to myself. This will be "the usual". 

Back to contemplating the view from outside the trenches of daily hands-on parenting. 

Empty nest milestone: the first semester away

As of January 2014, I've gotten through the first semester with Ky away and the first lengthy break back home. Some thoughts about this first step into my empty nesting journey:

I miss Ky less in the day to day than I thought I would, though my "life" misses Ky more than I expected to. 

Truth be told, I actually enjoy having the freedom of guilt-free time to do what I want, work as late as I want, go running at odd hours and to schedule things back to back to back without break. Single parenting an only child means that you're all they've got - you're the one they talk to, ask questions of, eat with, wish goodnight before bed. When I wasn't home, Ky didn't have that sounding board and companionship. Guilt used to flood me like acid when I couldn't get out of a commitment and Ky would be left with a microwave leftover dinner (more likely microwave popcorn) and Tumblr or a TV show. Sometimes Ky would call me at work to ask my advice or complain about a terrible day and my mind would spin, trying to switch gears from work to Mom-mode, and I was never the Mom I wanted to be at those times. 

And grocery shopping (or not) is so much easier. I'm a creature of habit in the kitchen, and $30 in produce and a little meat can get me through a week or more without a hitch. It's actually nice to not feel I have to be inventive with dinner, or even make dinner if I'm not hungry, or eat at 10pm if that's when I get home. Added bonus: if I buy a treat, it actually lasts until I finish eating it myself!

However I feel a lot more loneliness in the life-sense than I was expecting. I didn't realize how much Ky anchored me. How wanting to be a better mother and better example for my child actually made me a better person. How much of my definition of myself hinged on the fact that I had someone in my life that was half (or more) of the reason I did things on any given day. How Ky gave me most of my direction and purpose. 

I guess I've realized that as a parent I've grown like a bonzai tree branch around my role as a mother, and with my child subtracted from my day to day life, I'm this weird twisted shape standing alone, not seeming to make any sense without the scaffold I'd been wrapped around.

I always thought I had an incredibly strong sense of myself and sense of purpose as an individual. If I do, I can't remember how I expressed those things just yet. Part of my journey - if that word doesn't make it sound too hokey - is remembering how that rusty machinery works.  

Having Ky back for break has been a huge relief. I feel like things are just as they should be. I don't know how I'll feel next week, when college starts up again and Ky gets back into the ins and outs of dorm life, committees, classes and friends - and I get back to the ins and outs of an hour + commute, two jobs and the hectic rush of trying to fit in one too many obligations to fill the hole I don't want to acknowledge in the center of my life.