The Times they are a Changing

Come mothers and fathers

Throughout the land

And don't criticize

What you can't understand

Your sons and your daughters

Are beyond your command

Your old road is

Rapidly agin'.

Please get out of the new one

If you can't lend your hand

For the times they are a-changin'. B. Dylan

Just got back from a dream vacation in Italy with our family. Or shall I say, our Griswold European Vacation. Our oldest daughter Beth has been studying there for the past seven weeks and we went en masse to visit her for a few precious days in the Tuscany region.

 First stop Siena, where she was living. Siena is an unbelievably picturesque medieval village. Beth was waiting for us as we rolled into the hotel parking in our rented mini van, (seemed like a good idea on paper to get that thing and in retrospect it was but really all the van will be remembered for is giving the kids future ammo to mimic their father’s road rage trying to navigate a mini van on the tiny cobbled stone streets of a foreign land and me really helping matters by reminding Mark to ‘Just calm down’. That phrase rarely works the way you want it to yet it seems to be my “go to” in a pinch, always yielding the same result of having the opposite effect.)

We made it from the Florence Airport to our hotel (eventually) and it was great to feast our eyes on Beth. We missed her dearly; finally, I had all my little ducks in a row. I think every parent exhales that little bit of breath you don’t realize your holding in when all your family is together again after being apart and all is right with the world.

We spent the next several days exploring surrounding villages, eating amazing food and drinking great wine. We took things slow and our only agenda was to live la dolce vita, the sweet life, with our bambinos if just for a few days. Since moving to Florida a few years ago we had not been on a family vacation in quite some time, (our thought process is who needs a vacation when you live by the beach all year round. Another theory that really is just good on paper.) Something had changed in our family dynamic that I hadn’t noticed before this trip. Our children had grown up. I now know why Peter Pan was always my favorite story. I wanted my children to stay little forever. But just like Nana, I was being dragged out of the nursery.

Intellectually I knew that was the goal all along and we were passing milestones like graduations and birthdays to indicate that time was, in fact, going by. Get the little people, big and in one piece was our mantra over the years. Confident, kind, well rounded, independent people was what we were aiming for. Why was I so surprised when we finally got there? It wasn’t like it happened over night, it was of course gradual. Yet the rug was pulled out from under me as we sat in piattza’s eating fresh brushetta and drinking Chianti and I looked around at the kids my eyes did a double take still expecting doe eyed, chubby faced blond babies to be staring back at me. When MJ held her wine glass up and said ‘Mom, will you pour me a glass of wine’ I saw her four year old self with little pigtails and a sippy cup and had to blink a few times before the woman sitting in front of me holding up her wine glass came into focus. Now I am not implying that they are all grown up and they are out the door, we have got some time left. But there has been a shift. I have officially gone from manager to consultant for reals.

This next phase of life will be interesting for everyone if we all embrace the change. It’s scary to be facing the world as an adult for the first time. Just like when your three-year-old starts being what can only be described as a terrorist and you suddenly understand how people can actually let that kid go to “school” for a few hours everyday. When your kid is becoming an adult but still living under house rule they become a version of that terrorist again. Or rather, your perception of what they are “supposed” to be is shifting and brother you better go with it. Autonomy is a funny thing to a parent. My rational mind says, of course that is what we want! We have wanted you to be a responsible member of society since the day you were born. But then they start to self govern themselves and your parental instinct says, “Excuse me?” I remember when I used to work at Magic’s Pub as a waitress back in the day, Duke, the cook there would say, “I don’t call you son cuz you shine, I call you son cuz your mine.” But you realize that children are not your possessions. (YES THEY ARE, NO THERE NOT! My sister, my daughter.) The sacred contract is we get them through life with all the love and support they will hopefully ever need and when they are ready, they get to do it for someone else. The evolution of man continues.

Children growing up and out is scary for their parents as well. What am I if not the mother? Good God! Don’t go because then I’ll have to find out! Its sooo much easier giving baths and changing diapers than finding the meaning of your life. Hence the epidemic of adults who still act as though they are children. It’s not their fault! Their parents didn’t let them go when it was time and then all of the sudden your 28 year old “child” is still on your cell phone plan.

So I am learning to embrace the change. Some days my id will act up and I cling to what I already know so well, which is running the house like a tight ship giving orders and doling out punishments for minor infractions. (And loving them too.) But I’m learning to take a deep breath and let it go. Life as we know it is changing everyday for everyone no matter what we do. I have figured out that the world is still my oyster and everything is still possible. My son and my daughters are beyond my command and the times they are a changing, and  life is going to be just as is ought to be.

Gilda Radnor has a great quote,

"I wanted a perfect ending. Now I've learned, the hard way, that some poems don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next.

Delicious Ambiguity."

The Beginning.