Yes, there’s life after high school
So here’s a question I’ve been pondering lately: is there life after high school? I’m not asking this with my soon-to-graduate son in mind. No, it’s myself I’m thinking of.
Empty nesting is something I have joked about for decades. My youngest son was born when I was a few years shy of 40, and I have, since that time, maintained that I would not be an empty nester until I was too old to care.
I’ve always shrugged off the idea that it could be problematic. I don’t even like the term empty nesting. It sounds like I’m some hapless bird abandoned by her fledglings, still dazed by their incessant hunger, and left staring uncomprehendingly at a bunch of broken eggshells in a vacant nest.
Is that really an appropriate metaphor for a human mother whose youngest child is about to leave home? Well, maybe. To tell you the truth, I am feeling a bit hapless.
Lately I’ve been thinking about an incident that happened one Halloween when I was a child. My friends and I rang the doorbell of what turned out to be an elderly woman who, upon seeing us, became flustered. She hadn’t known it was Halloween, she explained, and had no way of knowing since her children were all grown and moved away.
She scrounged through her purse, dropped a single Lifesaver into each of our bags and closed the door, leaving us dumbfounded on her doorstep. How could someone not be aware of an important holiday like Halloween? Now I’m afraid I could be on the verge of becoming that woman.
I have lately been keenly sensitive to the fact that there is more to empty nesting than having no children in your house. There is a way of interacting with the world and connecting to the community that evaporates when you have no children in school. This inevitably impacts how aware we are of childcentric holidays like Halloween. But, it also affects the way we conduct our daily lives.
For example, just last week my son wasn’t feeling well so I called the school’s attendance hotline and left a message. When I hung up, I was struck by the realization that I will probably never have to dial that number again.
Similarly, I have likely attended my last parentteacher conference, signed my final permission slip, taped my last bus schedule to the wall, and, perhaps most strangely, received my last snow day robocall.
If it snows in the future, and kids get a day off, apparently that won’t even affect me. Nor will the first football game of the season, or the senior prom, or basically, any school event or day off. Maybe this doesn’t seem earth shattering, but my life has revolved around school activities and requirements for a long time. There is an automaticity about, for instance, sending in lunch money and checking grades that has formed the under layer of my daily existence for decades.
My oldest daughter is now 28. If you consider the fact that she attended preschool at age three, I have had children in school for what totals 25 years. That’s a quarter of a century. I’ve been to hundreds of conferences, signed what must surely amount to thousands of homework assignments and had maybe a million arguments that start with the words “You’re wearing that?”
Have I really asked that question for the last time? I have my doubts. But it is time to ask “Is there life after high school?” And of course the answer is yes. In fact, many of my friends have been empty nesting for years, and virtually all of them are content. They continue to lead busy, productive, and in some cases, very adventurous lives. They don’t seem hapless at all, and when Halloween rolls around, most of them are prepared.
I expect the same thing will happen to me. But, just in case, when my son leaves for college in the fall, I think I’ll pick up a couple of packs of Lifesavers on the way home.