The Next 48 Hours

Two days before my last child graduates from high school. The last of the early morning alarm sirens.
Mostly feeling very excited. But, also with a skip in my heart and a slight moment of, “who will I be without THIS job” that I’ve had for the past decades (not like I don’t already have a ton of backup jobs!). But, THIS job as I have known it, comes to an end.

For some crazy selfish reasons: no more early alarm clock settings, no more stumbling to decide what to grab from the closet to don for the day, packing for several different activities, rushing, making not only breakfast but also lunch at the same time - this time also means, goodbye to routines, some very good like fitting the morning run in before the kids’ alarm, packing for a morning gym workout for after school drop off, scheduling the day within a 5 hour period between dropping off and picking up again. All of this keeping me in check and accountable.

I won’t miss homework questions, grade checking, climbing the stairs for the 5th wake up call past the first snooze alarm or the obnoxious blaring of an alarm that hadn’t been heard for the previous 20 minutes, teaching the value of responsibility over and over again as if it is a new concept in our home, nagging about chores or enough studying for an upcoming test or thinking about cooking dinner at the same time doing laundry, and then getting through the nightly shower routines and in bed on time to start it all over again the next day.

I remember having to cross check everyone’s schedules: fitting in patients, working out, household chores, cooking meals, continuing education credits, work meetings, running errands between awards days or sick calls to pick up, field trips, school meetings, volunteering. Oh what a days it were. If juggling had been a major in college, I would have been an honorable graduate for sure!

Some of the parts that make my heart skip are the nights we ALL did homework together at the long kitchen farmhouse table surrounded by cooking scents, even those times where one of the kids would serve me coffee the following morning after finding me slumped over my own computer writing one of many 35 page “not to become doctorate” papers. Or those afternoon sessions when someone would complain that another was swallowing too loudly to concentrate on his own work at the table. Ugh, the marks left upon this table that still sits in our kitchen, albeit a different kitchen, that speak of so many memories…the blue marker line: when one grabbed it out of the other’s hand so vehemently it caused more than a blue squiggle but tears as well. Or the engrained print into the soft pine boards of another who didn’t use a notebook underneath his spelling work in 5th grade and then there’s the Exacto knife cuts during way too many science and art project builds over the years. 

So then there is the last pancake breakfast, the last batch of homemade cookies to leave the oven, the last folding of tiny t-shirts turned men’s large instead, the last Lego sale and more.

Other heart skipping moments include bearing all of the transitions - new schools, leaving schools, 7th grade graduations, 8th grade graduations, first heartbreaks, starting high school, last days of elementary grades, last days to homeschool, first drop off at college while still in high school, other high school graduations, and then the big moves with loaded cars off to colleges and/or work across different parts of the country. What still gets me is…the walking away part, the last hug, the last turn back, the last wave and then hand signing “I love you” as if we are the only ones who know the meaning.

And, there it goes again, the last morning alarm sirens after the previous snooze push….signaling the beginning of the next and last 48 hours.