The weekend before finals week, families in our community held a party that’s been a tradition for some years: The kids who went to elementary school together and who are now graduating from high school, along with their parents, gather to celebrate with a reunion/graduation/college kick-off party. I had heard that usually the kids leave after twenty minutes, so the party ended up being more of a reunion for the parents. Some of these parents have become close friends since we met in 2005 when our kids were in kindergarten. Others I know as acquaintances only, but our shared history binds us together anyway. So I was excited for this event. And I wasn’t disappointed!
I knew Maddie wouldn’t want to attend. I invited her, of course, and I assured her that so many people–parents in particular–would be thrilled to see her. That’s absolutely true. But her increasing self-awareness, although welcome in many ways, makes social situations like this one difficult. So her dad and I went alone.
To my delight, the kids stayed and stayed. They embraced old friends and even a few threw their arms around me–and not necessarily the ones I would have expected. It was wonderful to see these kids who at five years old struggled to cut out a circle or spell a word well enough to somehow be decoded, turn (very suddenly in my eyes) into young adults, most of whom were about to leave home–many heading across the country. “What’s next?” we all asked the kids. “I’m going to Brown.” “I’m going to Emerson.” “I’m going to Cal Poly.” “I’m studying in London before I start at USC.” “I’ll be playing basketball at Foothill College.” “I’m taking a gap year when I’ll be studying drumming in Africa.” I suspect some with less glamorous-sounding plans might have skipped the party. I really don’t know. But the level of achievement among this group was impressive if not particularly surprising.
And then there WE were. The inevitable question in our daughter’s absence: “What’s Maddie going to do now?”
A year ago I began to anticipate the difficulty of the year ahead. My friends, most likely, would be focused primarily on the college application process. This would be yet another time in my parenting life when I would feel a bit on the fringe, even among my closest friends. They’d all be talking about the counselor they hired to help their daughter apply to college, or the SAT prep classes, or the college tours that had begun the year before, when they explored the East Coast, Southern California and maybe the Northwest in search of the perfect fit for their exceptional children. They would lament the impossibility of getting into a University of California campus, the unfairness of the admissions process, the importance of the ultimate decision, and then finally the dread and anxiety they began to feel when the reality of their kid leaving home began to truly set in. And I would have absolutely nothing to contribute besides a whole lot of questions and perhaps some encouraging words.
I was partly right in my expectations. All of that was a big topic of conversation all year. But I wasn’t quite as discouraged about my inability to participate because, quite frankly, it all seemed pretty stressful to me. I had my own particular source of stress, as usual, but I was actually a bit relieved not to be a part of that. Plus I know it’s all coming in a couple more years when our son heads down that predictable path.
By the end of April most all of Maddie’s former classmates had a plan in place. I had heard updates through friends and was nothing but happy for each kid and excited for their future. So I knew the “what’s next” question would feature prominently at this soiree.
“So, what’s Maddie doing now?” they’d ask.
“We have no idea and we don’t care!” I would answer gleefully. It was an honest answer in every way.
Sometimes a follow-up question came. I suspect my original answer was just too surprising to be enough. “Is she going to go to school?” Maybe, I’d say. “Well, is she going to work?” Oh, I don’t know, I’d say. And I really don’t care! I’d say again. We need a break!
My whole focus for several years was simply getting Maddie to finish high school and get that frickin’ diploma! For most of these kids, graduation was more of a stepping stone to what comes next, as it was for me when I was a teenager. For Maddie and me it was The Goal. It was about to be completed, and I could truly bask in the glory of that achievement, likely an achievement that required more tenacity and courage from both of us than the truly impressive academic careers of most of the other kids there. So much to my surprise, the glaring difference between my answer and theirs didn’t bother me one little bit.
Perhaps I have grown. Perhaps my impending relief simply spoke louder than anything else that might have bubbled up in that moment. Perhaps I was genuinely so happy for everyone else that noting else really mattered. Whatever the reason, and I suspect there were many, I was at home among the parents and kids whose paths had been so different from our own.
So, what is next? Probably a whole lot of nothing–for awhile anyway. Maddie and I do indeed need a break. And we’re taking it.
The Year of Living Hopefully 