It was a morning like any other, I’d forgotten to run the dishwasher, the hamper of socks that I kept meaning to get to sat unmatched, and I’d spilled my coffee several times.
“B, do you have your lunch box and your folder?” I called from the laundry room.
“Yep.”
“Avery and Finley, are you dressed? You can’t be on the iPad before you’re dressed.”
“Yes, mom. I am,” Avery called.
“You’re dressed or you’re getting dressed?” Silence. “Ave, put down the iPad, get dressed and then come have breakfast, when you’re done then you can play.” I heard their muffled whispers and the shuffle of their feet as they returned the iPad to our room.
The clock read 7:19. “Two minutes, Bri.”
Running the iron over the sleeve of a blouse I watched out the window. The ice had been slowly melting, soon the walks to the bus stop would be crisp and sunny. I threw my shirt on and walked out to the living room. Sean and Briar were talking.
“You just look for the others and if they’re there you can stand. It’s just the being there alone we don’t want,” Sean explained. Briar nodded.
“Alone for what?”
“She’s going to walk.”
“Yes, I want to walk,” she said. I nodded and said, “Ok, we better move it.”
“No, mom, I meant walk alone. I want to walk by myself.” She smiled at me, her dangly, key-shaped earrings swishing. I looked at Sean and then back at Briar. The key earrings replaced the rubber ball danglies she wore the day before. She’d said, “Mom, look at this, every time they swing I just think, I came in like a wrecking baaaaall.” We had all laughed.
“Oh, ok. You, um, you want to just go? Now, today? Walk alone?” I asked.
“Yes, if that’s ok? I mean I don’t have to, but I’d like to,” she said with nervous excitement.
I was reeling. Yesterday when I’d walked to meet her, the bus was just pulling away. Her face broke into a huge grin and she ran to me, backpack larger-than-her torso swinging side-to-side. We walked hand-in-hand back to the house. I remember thinking how strange it was that I’d stopped panicking about being there before the bus arrived and that she’d just accepted that she’d start the walk alone if necessary.
“Ok,” I walked over to the front door quickly, checking to see if the other kids were outside. Sure enough, one boy was kicking rocks as he waited on his driveway, his sister was coming behind carrying her flute case. Just up the street another boy came down his driveway.
“Ok, B, they’re out there, go ahead.” She started down the stairs to the basement. “Hey, go this way, just go through the front door.” When Sean and I take her we go down to the basement for our coats. I felt a little numb as I watched her, she seemed slightly hesitant to go through the front door. “See, they’re all right out there.”
She scanned the street and then chirped an ‘ok’ as she slipped through the door. I ran into the other room and looked at Sean with my arms out at my sides. “What just happened?” He smiled at me, amused and proud. “She wanted to do it.”
I walked back to the door. I wondered where this had come from, how she had made what felt like such a huge leap without any foreshadowing. I pressed my nose against the frosty glass and wondered where my tears were. My heart was pounding and I could feel that normally they would be there, but they didn’t come. She stood beneath our towering trees looking tiny and huge at the same time.
Her steps were small and slow, she was barely moving.
I cracked the door, “B, get a move on or you’ll miss it.” She sped up and never looked back. I waited until all the kids had rounded the corner out of view. When the tears came it wasn’t for her having left me behind, it was for my not breaking from it. Somehow the time came for us to take a turn not holding hands and I didn’t realize it.
That’s a victory, right? Because sitting here right now it feels like the saddest thing in the world.
This parenting thing is just so full of bittersweet, isn’t it?
So bittersweet.
Full of bittersweet and always asking “What just happened?” (Also – her wit with the wrecking ball quip slays me.)
I crack up when I hear from teachers that she is quiet, this kid is full. Of. It.
We let our girls walk to the store by themselves this week. I’ve been trying to write about it – but..but..but..THE STORE and BUSY ROADS. AND OMG.
Love this. Except the ironing part. We can no longer be friends. xoxo
Write it, write it!
Yes, the ironing gave me pause as well. (More evidence that Amanda is, in fact, Superwoman.)
Ha! xo
I just keep coming back to the ironing. Maybe you need to vlog that…
Your comments have made me iron even more 😉 You know how the hem on flat sheets that is supposed to loo all pretty on top of your blanket when you fold it over? Mine are always cray wrinkled, so I ironed them and thought of you and snickered!
A victory, yes, but you’re allowed to have the tears too. That’s a rule in the Mama Playbook, didn’t you know? Uncanny the timing of this post because this week I told my 6.5 yo that she could cross the road near where we park at the school and go to the school yard by herself, if she wanted. It would require a solo walk along the length of the school building. The next day she wanted to try it. She got halfway down the length of the school, and then stopped, turned around, and asked me (with her eyes) if I could still walk her to the schoolyard. Not ready. And so we still walk there together. Reading your words here and feeling the lump in my throat makes me wonder if I really am ready.
Oh, you! Sometimes the gifts are in the hesitation that help us get there, no?
I love how you write. Your dialogue pulls me right in. And to know this actually happened is so comforting. Yes these moments are so unexpected and they always slay me. Our house is the bus stop so I haven’t had this particular milestone yet but I so know the feeling of your hand being empty without a little one inside it.
I remember years ago reading a post from a woman who was reflecting on an evening when her 9 or 10 year old climbed in her lap. She said something along the lines of—we both knew she’d grown too big for this kind of thing. My cried aloud. I think these things do happen, but there are wrinkles in the order that allow us to ignore it for comfort form time to time.
You made me cry, not only with this lovely anecdote and this gorgeous line, “Somehow the time came for us to take a turn not holding hands and I didn’t realize it,” but with the realization that this day is right around my own corner.
I walked to school hand-in-hand with my eldest yesterday. I tried not to pay that much attention when he dropped my hand as we entered the schoolyard. Deep sigh.
Oh, friend. I wonder sometimes which is worse, knowing that time is passing or looking up and realizing it’s already passed.
A huge success and hard one to swallow all the same. Love how you told it. We were right there with you.
And I am crying again.
glorious, you.
And, you!
Letting go.
It never goes away that tug at your heart and somewhere even deeper as you let go and let be. I have a 28 year old daughter and I still struggle with the letting go. I want to guide her and tell her the best way to get where she wants to go in life, but even though I am her mother, I have to let go.
Thank you for sharing this story with all of us.
Oh, you know, I kid myself into thinking that the worrying and “momming” eases up, but it really doesn’t, does it?
Hi Amanda,
I found you here via Twitter and #MyWritingProcess and what caught my eye was MamaSap. When you read this post you will know why. I’d love to be more connected to you- perhaps you’d offer a guest blog post on mothering and creativity? Just check out my site and let me know. xo A Sister in Sap http://laundrylinedivine.com/7274/show-work-writing-process-blog-tour-rolls-line/
Suzi, I am kind of blown away. Yes, yes, I would love to have our worlds collide. Your Berkshire connection makes me swoon, with Williamstown having been the place I met my husband and cemented my life on the east coast. Your description of how mornings begin, there was a familiarity laced with excitement. Thank you for following the thread and finding me. Let us begin to plot.