Oh- hey there, friend. Did you miss me? I’ve definitely been missing this space.
Which is a good, good thing.
For a while there, I wasn’t missing it.
It felt like yet another deadline, yet another thing I hadn’t done in any sort of timely manner, and yet another thing causing the ball of stress in my belly to poke me in the brain at 4am. (Isn’t that how your anatomy works?)
So I spent the summer reading books. Good books, not-so good books, trashy books, self-help books, books that I’ll definitely never read again, and books that I’ll hold like hugs to my heart. I adventured with my kids; day hikes, museum explores, floor naps, lemonade stands, movie nights, and popsicle stick projects that have zero hope of remaining structurally sound through the autumn. We traveled to Toronto, to the Berkshires, to Boston, to Cape Cod, to Washington Island, and back home to our gorgeous, gorgeous beds. Sure, I wrote- on napkins, journal covers, texts-to-self, even the occasional legit paper product- but there was zero Accountability Writing.
Turns out, I like Accountability Writing. I found myself missing having a tidily permanent outlet for my thoughts by the end of this summer- which aligned nicely with the beginning of the school year.
Wherein I helped my youngest baby start kindergarten and leave me for seven hours at a time.
Hoo boy.
Okay, other things I’m currently missing? My 5 year-old pal, for sure. Piles of blocks on sunny patches of living room floors, the pretense of midday naps while the Beatles play on tinny bedroom CD players, gangly arms and legs being carried through the kitchen in some semblance of a dance, and the surety of being needed so darned hard all day long.
If I’m being honest, isn’t that what I’m missing the most? The What Was/Shall Never Be Again that accompanies every milestone? My babies are all off at the same elementary school. Yay, we did it!
My babies are all off at the same elementary school. Wait, there will never be another Jumperoo/Exersaucer/bouncy seat in our home, not ever, not even if I play the Spotify Rockabye station on repeat for hours. (P.J. gently reminded me that we haven’t utilized one of those seats in close to 5 years and, in fact, I resented their bulky plastic-ness when we had them littered around the home like 1am minefields for the cats to detonate into trumpeting short blasts of loud, loud, loud songs. Regardless.)
On Jasper’s first day of kindergarten…
…There was a thunderstorm. I had planned every moment of photo-documentation down to the nth degree, and was overcome with anger over the thwarting of Our Big Day. I was about to send my newborn off into the world, couldn’t I just have this one thing?! (Stick with me, here.)
We hurried all three kids through the morning’s paces, through dutiful (damp) photography, through traffic, and through city-wide, rain-related chaos. (Y’all ever see frantic parents clutching sideways umbrellas and their kids’ hoods as they attempt casual, walking-to-school photos amidst hundreds of their closest friends? Not for the faint of heart.)
Jasper, a plan-happy kid if ever there were one, knew that his kindergarten class was to line up next to the playground doors. But when we rushed our way through the gates, we found…no class. No kindergarten teacher. No Previously Discussed Plan.
Rational Keely understands why the kids were all shepherded into the cafeteria during the thunderstorm to form their class lines there, but Rational Keely was nowhere present when staring down the barrel of Confused Jasper face.
“Maybe you should come inside with me,” suggested the smallest voice I had ever heard come out of any of my children.
I MEAN, YES, I thought. THAT IS MOST DEFINITELY WHAT I SHOULD DO, despite protocol, despite rational thought, despite the fact that he wasn’t quite fitting into the jacket pocket where I had contemplated putting him.
Thankfully, Susannah- competent, ol’ pro, second grade Susannah- took her brother by the hand and said “I’ve got him, Mom.” And she did. They walked together through the last of the rainstorm, into the big hallway, past the principal, and it was so nice that I couldn’t help but grab my phone for a quick video of that first/last walk away from me.
It sustained me on the block back to the car.
Sure, my plans had fallen by the wayside. Sure, my last kid’s send-off was less “releasing of the butterflies” and more “tuck and roll out of a moving vehicle,” but at least I had this video. This moment in time that could never- ever- be recreated, and was pretty unicorn-y and proof that I raised kind people and which would definitely be there for me to watch over and over again until kindergarten pickup at 2:40pm.
So when I discovered that I had never actually pressed record on my iPhone, I cried like I had broken both arms.
The day went uphill from there.
(After a short stint of weepily picking up toys and hearing songs that Jasper I would listen to during lunch prep, of course. It was like a weird middle school breakup.)
Then, I came to the stunning conclusion that I hate making lunch for people. I hate it. (Every kid wants lunch, but no one…really wants to eat their lunch, you know? There’s the busy work of prepping all that nonsense only to have people pick at it and then sort of leave this random mess which needs to be cleaned up before dinner. Very Sisyphean.) So in that moment of post-weepiness, pre-lunchiness, I realized that I was missing something I didn’t actually miss.
It was freeing.
Oh, sure, later on I saw a woman holding the hand of a toddler as they crossed the street and I experienced a brief pang of OH GOD NEVER AGAIN I AM A HOLLOWED HUSK OF USEFULNESS CAN I PLEASE SING TO SOMEONE…
…And then I saw that same toddler decide that they didn’t want to cross the road any longer, so they bodily melted and went boneless on the pavement and oh-my-goodness-I-laughed.
BECAUSE THAT SHIZ WAS HAAARD and in my newly discovered time of freedom I feel free enough to admit that I do not miss that stage no sir, no ma’am, no thank you.
(And I think that’s okay, too.)
Obviously- because I’m such an A+ student of the universe- I spent the rest of the day pondering my life and my path and what it all means. (I also took a nap.)
Here’s what I learned.
(…About myself, during a small slice of time, with a focus group of one): I think what frightens me the most, more than missing or changing or aging…is forgetting. Which is why I wept when I realized I had lost that video of Jasper and Suzy. Because what if I forgot that? That “blink and you’ll miss it” milestone” of my small baby leading my smallest baby into his future?
Yes.
Because something that large and dramatic and heart-clenching is something I’d probably just skip right on outta my brain, yeah?
Also, if my brain is such a sieve that Future Me might have trouble remembering such a momentous day, Future Me might also have trouble remembering that she has video documentation of said momentous day on her computer’s hard drive. Let’s call a spade a spade.
That’s not to say that I won’t plan on obnoxiously over-documenting the next chapters and phases of life. (The nap wasn’t that restorative.)
Sometimes missing things can be good. Sometimes they can bring what’s really important back into sharp focus. Sometimes saying the words “I miss this, but it’s still kind of okay” can be pretty healing, and can usher in a new season of life to obsess over and document and, sure, forget to press the iPhone’s record button during.
And sometimes the span of time missing a newly minted kindergartener means that when he rushes, beaming, into your arms at 2:40pm, you’ve had a good ol’ brain reset that allow you to fully hear his excitement about gym class and feel his sweaty, spiky 5 year-old hair, and gush with the love and knowledge that- at least for today- the harder comings and goings and missings are still an okay distance away.
And it can even feel pretty good.
(Especially when you get a picture like this on the second day of school.)
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