There Go the Little Years

The Baby's First Day of Preschool

It was the left turn out of the preschool parking lot that did it. How many times had I made that turn since my first baby started there, five years ago? This time I was able to feel a chapter closing - my fourth and last baby started school today.

It was a memory sensation wave that washed through me. While I still feel the past ten years bodily, they are moving to the back, becoming faint, as they have already begun to subside...

...Kissing the sleeping head of my baby in a wrap as I pushed two or three others in a stroller...
...Singing a song to keep a bored baby on the changing table for five more seconds to finish a diaper change...
...Popping out of bed for the third time to walk the floors and hoping after this time I could finally sleep until morning...
...That happy swell of what-was-that-emotion, so strong and right, as I sat down to breastfeed my baby, and my little love found what it needed -- me...
...Warning older siblings not to wake the sleeping baby (as they almost always did anyway) because naptime meant some small measure of respite for me...
...So tired, sometimes fighting morning sickness, rallying everyone into their carseats (that's a process) when all I really wanted was a BREAK, but we had to go grocery shopping...
 ...Remembering diaper bags, snacks, change of clothes, coats, shoes, cloth shopping bags, stroller, wrap, everything, everything, and then, where did I put my wallet?

That all-consuming, rich, utterly exhausting stage of life:  you are present, you have to be, that's how you make it through the day's demands, but then, where even are you in all of it? Whew! We made it - huzzah! And goodbye. How can I be sad, though I cry?

Another mom recently told me she wondered if she would ever come back. I so get that feeling. It's been ten years since I opened this chapter and wonder of all wonders, as I lift my head to look around, here I am! Now with a little space to feel myself again, or rather as I now am. Certainly not what I once was, and isn't it fun?

Goodbye my loves, my four small ones, now grown into chatty swimmers and kind-hearted breakdancers. Starting their own social lives and discovering their ways. I have loved holding your new little selves in my arms and then later taking your hand as you toddled beside me, singing and rocking out to kiddie and mommy and daddy music everyday, finding library treasures, watching you get very busy with your imagination, being the monster that made you squeal in half-fright, half-delight, finding you hiding in plain sight, and exploring every corner of beauty and playful inspiration we could find around these parts.

It has been an honor, and I am ready for what's next.

Whatever comes in the next ten years, I'm sure it will in turns confound me and put a smile on my face just as often as the last ten years. I know you and I are good for it.