The Ropes You Earned are Untied for a Reason

     Today is cap and gown distribution at the high school and my son will collect his graduation garb in advance of Thursday’s ceremony. He's earned a gold cord to drape over his shoulders in recognition of his hard work. Perhaps I am lacking emotional depth, but I am not the least bit sad for him or for me. The years he has spent in compulsory education have been sufficient to prepare him, and he has shared his restlessness with me. He is ready to graduate, and I am ready for him to do so.

     Not surprisingly, I am, in spite of my dry eyes, hopeful that when my son starts college in the fall he likes it. I hope he enjoys college as much as I did (yep, that much). I hope he finds people like him, who are supportive of his interests and aspirations, as much as I hope that he finds people who challenge him to move beyond the place he came from and the person he is now.

     College is a place where he can thrive if he chooses, and fall flat on his ass if he chooses. I can listen and I can counsel, but I cannot make those decisions for him. Neither do I want to make those decision for him, nor do I feel any panic or remorse at the loss of control. The days when I could direct his behavior are over; they have been for a while. Now, I request, suggest, and advise.

     When my son was born, I felt terrified of him. In the hospital, I let the nurses bathe him. He was small, and I thought, fragile. At first, he didn’t eat and I had to hold down his squirming limbs so a doctor, younger and possibly even more anxious than me, could draw blood from my son’s thread of a vein. He cried himself into a red-faced, stiff-limbed ball of anger. When I held my infant, I feared I’d break him, drop him, or hurt him somehow. Strangely, my fear was something I hadn’t known as a teen babysitter. At 17, I handled other people’s infants with greater confidence than I was capable of with my own child, at 30. Once the squalling, slippery baby is your own, there’s an understanding absent from a paying gig. As he grew stronger, so did I. We became people together. Now, it’s time for us to become people separately.

     Who the people are that we will become, I don’t know. I resist projecting on him a persona that comforts me, but may be entirely wrong for him. My faith in him is strong enough that I can let him become who he will, assured that I have drummed into his head the idea that if he needs a place to regroup; he can come to me as long as I’m breathing. He insists that he will not need to because he is determined to make his way successfully from Friday, June 10 forward; but my offer still stands, and perhaps that’s why he has the confidence to go ahead.

     We’re supposed to teach our kids so much: right from wrong, responsibility, independence, kindness, compassion, how to ride a bike, how to swim, when to speak up, and when to say no. We have arsenals of books and expert opinions as to how to do this. We have guides by which we can plot out our child’s development at each stage, so we know exactly what to expect (good luck with that, there’s always a crapshoot element). But how are we supposed to teach that in which we are not yet proficient?

     I’ve bluffed my way through many of the almost 7,000 days since my son’s arrival. My poker face is still deficient. He knows when mom’s betting on an empty hand. Fortunately, I don’t have to bluff often any longer. I can tell him I don’t know, or, I’m not sure, and we can still get through whatever. That freedom comes with the kid’s age, not mine. He’s old enough that I can be honest about my fallibility, and I don’t lose my position as his mom. Actually, I think once he hit second grade, we started working past the mom is perfect illusion. Although, that might actually be a realization I made, not him – I figured out that I couldn’t keep that act up.  We survived.

     We will continue to survive, I believe, in part because we’ve become people in our own rights, not just mother and son. Our relationship, and hopefully I’m not deluding myself on this, is not merely parent and child, but two individuals who share more than blood. We share history, memories, and a bond that started out of necessity, and continues out of respect. So, when I don’t cry at graduation on Thursday, know that it’s not a lack of love, but an abundance of respect for the person he is becoming that prevents the weeping.