Honoring Our Last Transition to College

Today is a big day in my family’s life.  As I am writing this, my wife is driving our rented minivan and our youngest is snoozing in the middle row as we are heading to their first year of college.  (A few roadtrip notes are also included below). Meanwhile, our oldest is in their first class of a new semester and our third is at home with Scout waiting to be driven to school on Sunday.  And come Monday night when my wife returns from the college drop-off, we will also be in a new stage in our marriage.

This morning, I headed out with Scout earlier than normal since we needed to get on the road around 8 this morning.  When we got to the lake, there was the smallest hint of light on the eastern horizon and our path was illuminated by the light of the (nearly) full moon.  As we came around to the lake and the benches about 20 minutes later, the light was starting to expand from the horizon and there were faint lines of clouds that were starting to be illuminated.  Normally, a scene like this would lead us to be there for a lengthy walk to take in the whole of the sunrise.  But that was not to be today.  I needed to get home to finish packing my bag and loading the car and our kid needed some time with Scout before we started driving.   So it was time to leave that moment and head home.

Roadtrip note - we just passed the King James Version 10 Commandments billboard between Cincinnati and Ohio

This parallels how I feel about this new moment in our lives.  Amy and I have been blessed beyond measure over the last two decades as we have muddled our way through being parents to these three amazing young people.  There have been moments I feel like we did a great job and other times not so much.  And through these last two decades, we have been able to (mostly) have a front row seat to see how these young people grew from babies to toddlers to kids to tweens to teens to young adults.  We have watched and we have also been participants through it all.

But we are moving into the stage where we will not be front-row quite as much as we have been.  We will still be a part of their journeys (and they of ours) but it will be different.  There is so much that we will not see and hear.  The changes that we see will not feel as slow and subtle (see upcoming post about the quote attributed to CS Lewis - isn’t it funny how day by day nothing seems to change, but when you look back everything is different) but instead they will come home for breaks as very different people (but still the same in other ways) .

This morning there was a small measure of grief about leaving the sunrise. I knew it was going to be a remarkable looking sunrise with the mix of clouds and rising light.  But I also knew that I couldn’t stay in that moment.  I had to head home for what was ahead for today and this new time to come.  But I was sad and there were several points as we were walking back to the car that I kept looking back and seeing how it was starting to grow brighter.  But we hopped into our car and headed home.  The minivan got packed up and we are now on the road.

Roadtrip Note - Just passing the “frosting gas station” in southern Columbus

I have an idea of what that sunrise would have looked like and it is a beautiful image in my mind and heart.  However, the reality would not have looked the same.

In the same way, there is low-level grief that I feel right now.  It isn’t heavy right at this moment but it is there.  It will grow in the next few days as we get our kid moved into the dorm and then as we eventually head home for the next college move.  When my wife gets home after the last drop-off and it is just us and Scout, we will be in a beautiful new stage of our life together.  It will, however, also be sad as the house will be a lot quieter and a lot different.  I can try to imagine what that time will be like but the reality will be surprising.  But both my imagined and the reality will be beautiful.

Roadtrip Note - we just passed a billboard advertising for Grandpa’s Cheesebarn and apparently we are stopping there as my wife is exiting the highway

I also can imagine what is ahead for each of our children in college and beyond. I am so proud of each of them and I see so much promise in each of them.  I see the beautiful people that they have each become to this point in their lives and I can imagine amazing things ahead of them.  I am so proud of how each wants to make this world a more just, equal, hopeful, and healthier world.  I see gifts that each have that humble me of what they are already doing and what may be ahead for them.  But we don’t know what is ahead for them - we may think we know what their life trajectories may look like, but the reality will be uniquely different.  Ultimately though, for me, it isn’t about whether the world would define them as “successful”, but I want them to be fulfilled and at peace in their ever-changing lives.

There are beautiful passages in Scripture that speak to hopeful futures.  “I know the plans I have for you...Stand at the crossroads and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way lies; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls...”   And then there’s these beautiful words from Sarah Bessey:

And our children become more themselves every day, living into their own experiences of being born again and again. The first baby I brought home in the mid-2000s is not the same as she was then: as I write this, she’s driving my old minivan, bringing home pamphlets for universities, and clocking in for her shift at the grocery store. She is and she isn’t still the baby with the triangle-mouth I held in my arms. She’s still the kid who dressed up as Darth Vader for Halloween when all the other girls showed up in princess dresses. She’s still the kid who read Roald Dahl books under the covers and wrote stories to swap with her friends and tacked up a life-size poster of the human body in her bedroom to more easily memorize the musculoskeletal system in grade three. And she isn’t that either. She’s who she is now and who she will be, and I will remember and love all the old versions of her even as I love the woman she’s becoming. I can’t lock her into who she was once, I have to stay in step with all of her evolution to know and love her well as she grows and becomes herself.

You are being born again, my friend. The old versions of you will be left behind. Sometimes it’ll be on purpose, other times it’ll surprise you. But one of the kindest things I can do for you is to simply bless your transformation. God is faithful to you in this, too.¹

Do you see this sunrise moment in Sarah’s words?  I do.  In her words, in Scripture, in this sunrise, and in this moment, I see the beauty of what has started to emerge but the realization that something new, unique, and beautiful will continue to rise.

Grace, Peace, Love, and Joy,
Ed

Last Roadtrip Note - Posting this later in the afternoon after my 4 hr driving shift. Laughing about the RFK Jr related things we have seen in Western New York… A sign for Falconer, New York, a sign warning for bear crossings, and then a sign for Kennedy, New York…

Sarah Bessey

1. Bessey, Sarah. Field Notes for the Wilderness: Practices for an Evolving Faith (pp. 52-53). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition