It's a Good-Hard

It's a season unlike any other for me. In various ways, many of my birdies are leaving the nest. Times, they are a changin' (cue melodramatic music). This is my season of birthing-new-life-and-dying-death.

With my youngest three going to "real school" this fall, 13+ years of homeschooling have come to a close.

My first-born son graduated from college, got engaged and is about to embark on the mission field with his amazing fiancé to the "hardest darkest" places.

Last week, my one and only daughter left for France to live her life-long dream of living in Europe. Thank God for Skype.

My 18 year-old recently graduated from high school, and this fall will jet off to Tennessee to begin his college career.

My 15 year-old just left for an eight weeks long internship on a farm in Vermont.

Oh, and our family cat of 14 years died. 

All of these things are good things (except for the cat part). But that doesn't make them easy. They're still hard. But they are good-hards. 

Having had more bad-hards than I care to recount, I'll take good-hards any day of the week, including Sundays, over bad-hards. Still, my heart aches. I miss my babies.

I remind myself that this birthing-new-life-and-dying-death season is good. It's not the dying-death-only season. No, that valley I've visited (and by "visited" I mean I was dragged through it, kicking and screaming bloody murder). No, this season... This is a good one. This season gives life. But, dang, it still hurts.

My season of good-hards is here. And being all too aware of the excruciating pain and damage bad-hard seasons bring, I welcome my good-hard season with joy and a little trepidation. 

In a world full of far too many of those yucky bad-hards, I want to embrace and welcome my season of good-hards. 

So, here I go, "Season of good-hards, welcome. Let's eat chocolate, and do this."

A homeschool mom goes back to school

My first day of school went well. Since this is my first time back in a class room in over 25 years, there are many new things. 

The last time I was in a classroom there were no cell phones, no laptops, no internet. Back in my day, if a student propped their Converse-clad tootsies on the table-top, the teacher would have promptly walked over and pushed them off. Nowadays, not only is it okay for the student to do so, the teacher leads the charge.

Another thing about going back to school after 25 years is this whole internet driven world. Back in my day only rich kids had home computers and there was no such thing as internet. Shoot, phones were still attached to cords & walls. Now here we are in the 21st century and the class syllabus, schedule and other class-related information is apparently available on the internet before the first warm-bodies-sitting-in-the-classroom day. For me this meant that there was an assignment due that first day. Ha! Who knew? Obviously, not I. 

Thankfully, our instructor gave grace and allowed us to turn the assignment in during the next class. He did seem pretty pleased with himself as he smugly announced the assignment, though, which rubbed me a little, being as how he's all of 13. He said something like, "I know none of you checked this, so I'm ready to receive complaints, but there was an assignment due today." The one comfort I took in my ignorance of such a new-fangled approach was that, apparently all these internet savvy, young whippersnappers were as surprised as I was by this already-due assignment. Ha! 

In case you're wondering what course I'm taking, it's a public speaking class. And yes, only one class. I figure one class is pretty ambitious seein' as how I homeschool three of my little birdies, seven of our eight are still in the nest and I'd like to get a passing grade. 

Upon hearing that I'm taking a public speaking class, those who know me will probably be all like, "WHY in the world are you taking a public speaking class?" Explaining that dynamic gets a little complicated and weird because, while I totally get why they'd ask that: I'm a decent communicator, straight shooter and generally speak my mind. The thing is, that's not always-in-all-situations the case. Without going into the dirty-laundry portion of my life, I'll simply say I'm on a journey to find my voice again. And there is a part of me that sees this class as a baby step in that direction. Even still, it's so much more than that for me. 

And the whole process is thrilling and terrifying all at the same time. I'm doing my homework and (barely) remembering to go to class (hey, it's been over 25 years), and thoroughly enjoying my new venture. I'm thinking and wondering weeks in advance, what will I give my first speech on? I'm exhilarated, excited and generally thrilled with a side of terrified. 

Then I attend last Thursday's class, a teaching on visual aids, and learn we will be graded on our appropriate usage of visual aids in every speech we give. >Gasp!< 

Hey, I can talk, I can give a speech, I'm even a fairly decent actor. Plus, I'm not generally given to stage fright. But use visual aids? Is he high? Do I look like I can walk and chew gum at the same time? 

I'm immediately sobered from my I'm-a-butterfly-about-to-emerge-from-her-cocoon-and-flyyyyy!!! stupor and thrust into maybe-I'm-just-gonna-be-a-plain-old-moth zone. 

Visual aids. Who's stupid idea were those any way? Pppffftttt! 

My one saving grace may be the fact that my professor says not all speeches call for visual aids, which is why he said we'd be graded on our, "appropriate use of visual aids." Cool! Great! Sign me up for whatever topic does NOT need visual aids. Either that, or maybe I could do a speech on the proper care and use of crayons, markers and poster board.

Carpe Dieming

Today's my 45th birthday. I feel like I should have some profound wisdom to impart to mark the occasion. Alas, I do not, unless you count how grateful I am for spell-check because without it, I would always spell "occasion" wrong.

Forty-five feels like most other days. It only starts to get a little weird when I realize that my daughter turns 19 today, and tomorrow my first-born turns 22. Yeah, the fact that I have kids that old is weird to me. However, the fact that I'm ridiculously proud of both of them definitely helps with the mish-mash happening in my brain as it struggles to reconcile the fact that I'm old enough to have kids that old. And (since you asked) here are a few more reflections as I cross over this mid-life threshold:

At 45, I'm

• six years away from being an empty-nester. That idea was nothing but completely appealing when my kids were barely out of diapers and naps. Now that they're all so self-sufficient (and tall), I'm beginning to feel the pangs of impending emptiness. 
• three years older than Ray ever was. Since he was seven years older than I, that's extremely weird. As the years continue, I suspect that will just keep getting weirder.
• going back to school. Yes, at "mid-life" I'm experiencing a new beginning and that's very exciting (okay, and a little bit terrifying).
• mom to a 22 year-old college senior.
• more appreciative of the truth of the saying, "the older I get the better I was," mostly as it relates to physical perkiness. (Just keepin' it real, folks.)
• more secure and comfortable in my own skin than I've ever been (yes, even in spite of the above mentioned fact).

One one hand, forty-five years seem impossible for this girl who can so easily touch her high school days, her newly married days, her new mommy days. On the other hand, this same girl is acutely aware of the few years that ruthlessly stole more than their year's share.

I like to think 45 years of life have given me balance and perspective and appreciation. Oh, I'm still a very black & white personality, but I am more comfortable with that fact now; much less inclined to cower to disapproval. I like to think I've gained a better perspective of grace in the hard, a better balance of justice & mercy.

Each of my (eh'em, very few) wrinkles says something about who I am, where I've been. Even the battle scars remind me of strength I didn't know (or want to know) I had. And I'm eternally thankful to the ones who have fought by my side during the battles. 

So yeah, 45 and life is too good to pass up. I'm carpe diem'ing the you-know-what out of all 365 of 45.

My daughter and birthday twin, Alexa & me in Tahoe, 2012

Life Actually

I really want to be doing this bloggin' once or twice a week. So far I'm stinkin' that up. It's the holidays, people. And for us that also means five birthdays, our first-born, college senior coming home with his amazing girlfriend-whom-we-adore & little bro in tow, me baking and cooking like a freak, decorating (and UNdecorating, bleck!), movie-watching, game-playing, stray-sock pick-upping. 

And now that the holidays are almost over (three birthdays in two days left -- this Thursday & Friday will finish them up), that dirty word SCHOOL has started back up. Ugh! Plus, hubby is away with our most recent 13 year old on a manhood weekend. Since his birthday is in winter, they're doing something none of our other boys (who have summer bdays) will have done when they did their big-13-manhood-away-with-Dad-weekend... dog sledding. Yep. Dog sledding. How cool is that?! (It's all a big secret, so I'm not s'posed to tell... so shhhhhh!) 

Add to that my only daughter is jetting off to Europe in a mere five months to fulfill her life-long dream of living there, so we're ticket-buying and visa-getting, and I'm all, "Tito, get me a tissue." More on that another day. Right now, I'm in denial, so we'll just be done talking about it.

So hubby's gone & I'm holding down the fort, doing what I do and not blogging. Another reason for that is that I edit things TO DEATH, so I need a mountain of time to write and eventually post a blog entry. I'm working on this (in fact this is my first shot at "letting go" of a post), but for now, it's a problem.

While I'm wishing-I-was-blogging-but-still-not, I've learned of some friends who are facing some really heart-wrenching realities with their first-born. Actually, they've been walking this road with their little guy for 13 years, but over the last six or so weeks, things have shifted significantly. So significantly that life as they and their other three children know it has screeched to a halt. So significantly that they are having to think about things no parent should ever have to think about. And I am undone. I think... Lord, are you kidding me? And yet, this mom, this woman who has already faced and overcome so, so much, she's blogging and she's blogging well. 

I've been her fan for a long time. Let me tell you, this woman can write! If you haven't yet read her blog, do yourself a favor and check it out. Most of her entries are hilariously spot-on in the department of real life. She captures it all with striking accuracy, but along the way she also tells her story. She tells of extremely high-risk pregnancies, of losing her precious twins, of her incredible premies, of adoption, of life as the wife of a rock-n-roll husband, of love. 

If you've checked in here lately and have wondered where my next blog entry is, just know, I'm still feeling this whole blog thing out, trying to get a rhythm and not be so anal about the editing process. In the meantime, and even after I get a decent rhythm, go check out my friend's blog http://radiantjess.blogspot.com/. Look around a bit and make yourself at home. You will cry tears of joy and sadness. I guarantee you, you will laugh your head off. And please, when you read her latest blogs on her little guy, Richie II (R2), pray. Pray. Pray for his healing. Pray for Mommy and Daddy and his siblings, Toby, Brynn and Tristan. Pray for peace and comfort in the unknowing and the waiting. Pray for R2.