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Published: August 1st 2006
I was told after the last entry that I should put a tissue rating on these entries … 1 tissue rating means give it a few minutes and your OK, 5 tissue rating means you could be red faced for 30 minutes to an hour or so, 1 box tissue rating means take the rest of the day off. I think the last one was a 1 box rating .. sorry for not letting you know of the rating system up front! Maybe you had some sick time built up you were able to use.
This one is probably not but a 1 or 2 tissue rating depending on how many Hallmark cards you have read lately! And I promise, with the exception of just giving you an update on how Joshua is doing, this will be the last one where I sit watering the keyboard.
So, what exactly is there to do now … I am packing Joshua’s stuff … packing my stuff, and packing Anthony’s stuff. Anthony is packing my stuff and his stuff …. Joshua is letting me pack his stuff! Wait! Isn’t he grown? Not on my watch!
It is all coming much too quickly all of a sudden. ONE week from tomorrow we will be packing the car and the truck with everything that will be Joshua’s life for at least the next semester. We are going to be selling the house we are in now, so he literally will not have a room to come home to here again, once he leaves.
Yes, he’ll have a room in Africa, at the grandparents, Aunts, and friends - but his childhood room is gone. We sold it right out from under him to move to Africa. When I go home to my parents’ house I still stay in the bedroom I grew up in. The wall color has changed - several times I might add - since I lived there - but it is still my room. I wonder if I would have been so co-operative if my parents had done what I am doing? Probably so - I like to think that is one of the characteristics of mine that Joshua has acquired. Just give me a place to hang out and I am OK with that. As they say a house isn’t the home - but the people living in it.
We have just about everything he needs right now, the final touches such as laundry soap, toothpaste, etc … we’ll get once we get there. No sense in loading it here when we can get it there. I may leave his room a lone for a while - just in case - WHO AM I KIDDING … I need the space … we’ll clean it out the next day! I have to have somewhere to start putting these boxes we have already packed! But I’ll cry the entire time I am moving the furniture - well, maybe we’ll leave the bed up and put fresh sheets on it - no sense in being hasty.
Has anyone seen the new Taco Bell commercial “Good To Go”? I saw it for the first time tonight … I have to say it was cute and touched just a little too close to home.
A mom and dad come into the living room where their son is watching TV. Mom says something like, “I think I finally found something that’s as spicy as you like. It’s all in one - it’s good to go.” (It’s a type of taco, grilled burrito, thing all wrapped up and sealed so you can eat it on the go without the stuff falling out)
As the parents repeat the “It’s good to go”, the camera spans to the door where all of his luggage sits packed to head to college. The next scene is the Mom and Dad standing in the yard while the kid is in the taxi loaded with luggage eating his whatever it’s called … and the announcer saying …”It’s good to go.”
And I admit … it’s good that our kids go. After all we wouldn’t have kids if we weren’t in the same position some many years ago. Plus - this is what I have been told is payback.
It’s like the circle of life - my Mom told me this was all my fault. Let me explain.
When my Mom and Dad married, at some point around there, he and Mom ended up working in the Bahamas. After I was born, I of course accompanied my parents to the Bahamas, putting my Mother in a position where she had to separate from her mother and take her grandchild away from Sparta, Tennessee. Then 18 years later, I was again responsible for tears when I went to Freed-Hardeman. Then 11 years later I was yet again responsible for tears when Anthony and I moved to Tanzania, East Africa, being accompanied by our son, my parents’ only grandchild. Now, a mere 14 years later I am the one shedding those same tears as I replace my Mother and her Mother before her in this wonderful Circle of Life God has so richly blessed us with.
Yes, I am a cry baby! But I know it’s part of the way God wanted life to continue. Anthony and I are truly excited about this part of his life. Actually a little envious in a good way of the incredible journey he is getting ready to start. I remember the day I was left at college and I hope he will as well. I know my Mom remembers and there is no doubt I will have it forever etched somewhere there in my brain. It will be sitting on my sleeves for a few weeks, until some time passes and then it will be added to the archives of the vast collection of memoirs with space next to it for yet another grand event.
Remember when we all thought “If I could just have a few minutes to myself?” In just over a week I’ll have all the minutes …. Okay … maybe this is a 3 tissue rating .. but, I am going to stop before all of our keyboards short circuit and we cause a National Black Out - Hang in there ladies Dad is doing his share of cleaning the tear ducts too!
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Megan
non-member comment
Shasta, I loved reading this...you are wonderful at articulating exactly what you mean and are feeling. I love you guys so much!