If you follow me over on my public facing (i.e. heavily curated) Instagram, you’ll see that since the last time i was present in this space, I’ve read some books and done a little knitting and hung out with my cats. You’ll see some flowers (my peonies were really good this year) and some skies and a little wheel of changing seasons.
However you’ll only see glimpses of the biggest events – those that involve my Person, my only child, as she finished her senior year in high school, went to prom, and graduated.
She wore a stunning red corseted gown to prom (she didn’t like red initially but sometimes the dress picks you).
We gave her a party – not a big party, just for some of the people who are really important to each of us – which was a little stressful for me because I’ve never given a party before, but she had a vision and she curated it. (It was wildflower themed, and she picked all of the flowers for our planters, and she arranged all of the blooms we bought for the mason jars on every table. She set out her childhood Polaroid camera with her guest book, washi tape and paint pens, for all of our guests to sign. And she is painstakingly writing thank you notes on botanical themed cards. This is a project and a half for her but she is grimly determined to get them done.) We had a cappuccino cart with two amazing baristas who loved our Pride flag and our ferns and our front porch overgrown with Boston ivy. They paid us the highest compliment when they said that we live with “intention”.
And just this past weekend, she was “orientated” at her university of choice ahead of starting fall semester. Her dad and I spent a day at Parent Orientation with her but not with her and saw where she will flutter off to from our nests. (I don’t remember anything like this when I went off to college. My parents drove our minivan the hour and a half to my school, dropped me off, and picked me up a few days later. There wasn’t any “parent orientation” and we were all shell shocked for the better part of my freshman year.)
All of this pretty much absorbed me for the past six months – on an almost cellular level – and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I read a quote during this process – “mothers are the givers of roots, seldom wings”. Our roots are deep and that is indeed what I consider to be the work of my adult life. But I want wings for her, too.
Now the summer has really started with a heat wave swiftly bearing down on us. (I know no one cares to read about weather in blogs…) I feel like I am about to plunge into another phase of processing all of the change that is happening with people in my life. I just want to be quiet now and sink into a summer of anonymity and privacy. Talk to no one, sleep a lot and get sun in my bones. Read some old Anne Rivers Siddons books at our pool club, drink wine on the porch in the evenings and tend to my own self, at least for a little while.
Six Ten 