A look back at the milestones as son finishes senior year
There are so many milestones between the ages of 0 and 18 that
they seem to blur together after a while, especially if it’s your
own child.
And then you wonder to yourself: How did we ever get here? How
did this little baby suddenly grow up, become a high school
student, grow hair on his face, and graduate from high school?
It’s still a complete mystery to me.
A look back at the milestones as son finishes senior year
There are so many milestones between the ages of 0 and 18 that they seem to blur together after a while, especially if it’s your own child.
And then you wonder to yourself: How did we ever get here? How did this little baby suddenly grow up, become a high school student, grow hair on his face, and graduate from high school?
It’s still a complete mystery to me.
In less than a week, my youngest son will take a flying leap into adulthood, as he walks across that stage and receives his high school diploma. I’m still trying to wrap my mind around this. It’s not going to be easy.
I think about when he arrived in the world, three weeks early and looking like a plucked chicken, and can’t figure out how he got to be 6-foot-2.
I think about the toddler I used to know, with the chubby cheeks and sunny demeanor, who loved to sing “Itsy Bitsy Spider.” Now he is Mr. Cool, reluctant to be seen with anyone resembling a parent, and he sings in the shower but not in front of me.
I think about the kindergartner that he used to be, the guy who wore his rain boots to school not just when it was raining, but every single day. Now he has a yellow vest he wears every day. He does have a thing about familiar articles of clothing.
I think about the time he was so sick with stomach flu that I was ready to take him to the hospital if he didn’t stop throwing up. I had car keys in hand when he suddenly began to get better.
I think about the first-grader that he was, struggling to learn to read, and the teachers who wondered if he was learning-delayed. Now he’s a straight-A student.
I think about taking him to Disneyland and losing him during the Main Street Parade, and then finding him a few minutes later, my heart pounding, and him looking up at me quizzically, as if to say, “What’s the big deal, Mom?”
I think about him reciting the Cub Scout promise, with that cute cap on and the navy blue shirt, and the hours I spent helping him do projects and driving the other Scouts on field trips.
I think about arriving at a middle school dance to pick him up, and peeking in at the gym door to see him dancing with a girl from his class, and then not saying anything about it when he was in the car on the way home, because I knew it would embarrass him no end if I commented on it at all.
I think about him putting on his high school band uniform for his first marching competition, and helping him with all the buttons and braids and suspenders. And then seeing him at his first marching competition, playing his heart out.
I think about the beginning of senior year, when I couldn’t talk him out of taking a full load of academically challenging classes that included physics, calculus, AP psychology and French 2.
I think about this morning, when he dragged himself out of bed, finally getting really, really tired after eight months of relentless homework and studying.
It’s almost over.
And I know every other parent out there with a graduating senior is thinking about these same things, the visions of their children’s childhood an endless loop, as they try to figure out how they grew up so fast.
It’s a question that’s impossible to answer, and yet there it is.
Time passes. Things happen. And then they’re out on their own.
