“Fly”

 

“There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children. One of these is roots, the other, wings.” ~ Hodding Carter

It starts out simple, the providing roots parts that is.  We pick out their clothes, decide on their food and a bedtime.  We choose what books to read and what Christmas traditions they will follow.  We decide if we they have ham for Easter and turkey for Christmas.  We choose their friends and companions depending on how well we get along with the different moms and steer them away from the ones we want to avoid.  We provide roots and structure and a “life” and they pretty much need us all the time, so it’s easy. I mean, good grief, they can’t poop without our help.

We have complete control and all is well.

Then they start to grow up, they go to school.  We send them off and we are unsure; we are losing control.  That is when the wings come into play; that is where things get dicey.

Remember the first time your kid forgot their lunch and you left your own lunch hour to rush them their carrot sticks and peanut butter and jelly?  What about the second time they forgot it or the fifth because pretty much if you are going to go ahead and bring it to them then why should they remember it or did you solve that by asking them every single day if they have their lunchbox?

It’s their damn lunchbox and guess what, if they forget it and go a little bit hungry or have to eat a nasty school hot lunch mess, they won’t be as prone to forget it the next time.

Fly, people, fly.

Do you decide what they are going to do for after school activities, even though they are old enough to take a shower by themselves and stay home alone?  I didn’t say let them take up hang gliding but I’m so grateful for parents who let me make my own decisions about the things I wanted to pursue and never had an opinion between cross country or cheerleading.

Wings, people, wings.

Do you unpack their backpack and organize all their papers and sit down with them to make sure they get it all done?  I did with my first child until fifth grade.  Hell, I felt like every time he got a report card that they should make me my own copy because, pretty much, it was my grade too.

When the kid got to sixth grade I made a vow to never look in his backpack again; to not try to memorize or even understand his complex middle school schedule.  The kid was smarter than me so if he couldn’t figure out how to get his homework from his teacher to his backpack and back to school after completion it wasn’t because he wasn’t smart enough it was because he didn’t give a crap and really up until this point I gave the crap for him so he didn’t have to.

Soar, people, soar.

And now he is in college, he’s close to legal drinking age.  I could go into any bar in the city this fall and see my son sitting there.  He can vote and drive and go to war and the decisions he makes are his own.

But since the time he was a small boy I was raising my boy to be a man.  I was raising him to be someone’s employee and friend, someone’s grandson and someone’s co-worker, someone’s cousin and maybe someday, someone’s husband.  I was never raising him to be Mamma’s little boy.

And when he makes a decision I think will be hard on him and he does something I would rather he not do, it’s hard and as I search for the silver lining I think this:

He won’t always fly high but you see different things depending on your altitude and the vision is his to have and not mine; whether he’s looking at the ground, running into a bush, or flying amongst the clouds – because his mistakes are his to make; if they are indeed, mistakes.

Some people thought getting pregnant at twenty was a mistake and almost 21 years later I’m still wrapped up in the silver lining of that happy accident, and talk about learning to fly………