Milestones

   And in the blink of an eye they day has come.  Abby walked briskly down the walk, backpack in place, ready for high school to begin.  Butterflies have set up residence in her stomach, but she is still positive. Her energy sits like an explosion on the head of a pin, controlled and balanced.

    As a parent we have the knowledge of what comes next. We can remember those high school years of our own.  So we sit on the roller coaster, this time in the back seat, watching and quietly waiting all summer as the cars make their way up the first hill.  We know that today we have reached the top and that the ride will have its fast descents and twists and turns and big loops.  We know that the next four years will be fun and scary and that they will walk away from the experience a changed person and hopefully more prepared and excited for the next adventure.

    These kids sit in their roller coaster cars today making their way to the school and they have no notion of what to expect these four years will bring.  Their future is blank, a white sheet a paper, a blank slate…however you want to visualize it…  They look forward to it whatever it holds.   We know what’s next and we know it will go as fast so we look back. We look back on our baby’s life. We remember all the first day of school photos and the outfits and maybe missing the bus on their first kindergarten day…or maybe that’s just me…  We look back and miss our baby who needed us.

   When did milestones get so big?  I saw yesterday on FaceBook a friend posted that her little boy sat up for the first time.  Are milestones relative? Is the size in direct proportion to the age of the child?   Sitting up, crawling, walking, riding a bike.  Each of these is one step closer to independence.  They aren’t small milestones, but I don’t think we look at them and feel the need to grab our kid and wish they were younger.  (Probably because we are sooo ready for a child to entertain themselves or to go to the bathroom by themselves that we don’t want to hold those steps back.) 

     I think shit gets real when they step on the school bus that first day of kindergarten. But after you push that lump down in your throat you savor the quiet time when the bus pulls away…even if it is just five minutes before heading to work.  Somewhere in the middle of grade school you suddenly realize five years have passed and your baby grew in more ways than just out of coats and shoes and jeans.  They started becoming a person you could have more serious talks with or you could travel without schlepping half the house.  Those are all stepping stones, milestones that we recognize, but this one, the beginning of high school is one that leaves us conflicted as the bus pulls away.  We want to hold them and never let go. We want to slow the passing of time in ways we have never experienced.  And despite being excited for them because we can remember so clearly going to high school dances and meeting new friends and discovering ourselves, we want to hold their hand again and be the one thing they need the most in life.  We remember what it was like to see them lying on our stomach when they were three months old, exhausted from the day and having them lift their head and look into our eyes. We knew at that moment we were their everything. We were the source of all things, love being the most important. 

Milestones.  They are the hours on the clock of life. They bring smiles and laughter and sometimes tears because we know that moment will never be repeated.  But then we must remember…no moment can be repeated. Every second of every day is the only one we get.  So I will sink into this moment and hold onto it with the strength of a 1000 men but then I will release it to the wind and let it pass like all the previous milestones leaving just a memory of her walking down the brick path and turning to look at me before heading to high school.