To create

“Now, go.”

I looked up when the commencement speaker uttered those two words not long ago. The words aren’t all that special, it seems, even though the speaker used the Latin form, nunc ibo. Latin makes anything sound important, so maybe that’s what caught my attention. But the words, profound in their simplicity, stuck. Now, go.

The formality of that Latin phrase contrasted with my youngest child, our newest daughter, as she showed off her fresh-bought backpack, lunchbox and glasses the other day. First grade is a big deal. She needed all the right gear and she splayed out the tulip-colored accoutrements on our couch with a big grin. She showed off to her older siblings, including our son who is a high school senior. What a difference in age, in experience, I thought. We’ve been the first-grade route several times and it all makes sense in that one phrase.

Now, go.

Our daughter is only 6.

She spends hours drawing our house, our dogs, our family. She likes shark books because she thinks they scare me. She can ride a bike like a champ. So when she started school last week, we, like every other parent, mentally uttered those two words. It’s not a negative demand, it’s not a comment born in the relief of freedom from summer schedule juggling. It’s a wish, a blessing, to carry our children along the way.

“Now, go,” we say.

What we mean is that we’ve lathered our kids in lessons on right and wrong, we’ve strengthened them with unbending love. Now, go create a life in the beauty of independence; create a life that is wholly yours. It’s as meaningful for a first-grader as it is for a high school senior.

Reflecting, I realize I haven’t gone very far in life. I can see the hospital where I was born from my front porch. I live two blocks from the elementary school I attended. I eat lunch in the same cafeteria I ate in every day as a 14-year-old. However, going is not all about miles traveled, but the essence of life lived. Preparation for that life involves a bundle full of school experiences.

Now that the school year is underway, we’re fully engaged in shuffling our regimen and getting schedules in sync with our biorhythms. Muscle memory is returning. The newness of the year unfolds.

“Now, go,” we say.

For parents with small children, that means that we’re letting go just a little so our kids can take their first tentative steps on life’s path. We’ve taught them to live in community, to share, to follow instructions. We’ve also taught them to explore, to find what catches their fancy and hold it.

School will explode with possibilities for them. They’ll be learning their letters and how those letters come together in beautiful code to form words. They’ll have experiences totally independent from our own. As elementary school kids, they’ll share every single detail—the sublime and the mundane—and their chatter will form the background music to each and every family gathering.

But it won’t always be that way, I remember.

The chatter lessens with age. Maybe it’s because the sublime has become the mundane. Or maybe it’s because our older kids hold those experiences closer to themselves. That’s okay, though. That’s called introspection whether our kids understand the power of that word or not.

Soon, the slow build to adulthood embodied by high school occurs. Our one-time first-graders transition to young adults. We’re thankful for the good high schools in our lives because good high schools know they aren’t meant to fully replace parents, but to enhance the finer points of parenting. They’ll teach kids the importance of showing up— fully and completely. They’ll teach the great value in doing one’s duty. They’ll teach each of their charges to embrace individuality while moving forward in the group.

Like other parents with young children, I relive memories of previous school days as I watch my daughter’s first week on campus. It’s a beautiful process, a process that leads step by step to adulthood.

People used to tell me that it all goes by so fast. With my first child, I discounted that advice. Now, as I look at my high school senior, I know those people were speaking truth. My senior’s time at home is quickly slipping by. It’s almost time for him to leave.

Soon enough, athletic fields, gymnasiums, and auditoriums will fill with long lines of graduating seniors, replete in their mortar boards and gowns. As parents, we’ll experience that wonderful moment of our child— our one-time first grader—walking across the high school graduation stage, accepting a well-earned diploma and smiling to us.

We’ll try to take it all in and freeze that moment for just a second, just one more mental screenshot before it’s all released. We’ll see that first-grader in our young adult, we’ll remember those first days when shark books and crayons were enough to fill a life. We’ll inhale the possibilities contained within our graduate and whisper prayers of thanks and of hope.

After the mortar boards have been thrown, we’ll reach forward to grasp our children, hold them close, and say with sincerity and pride those important two words, that incantation profound in its simplicity:

Now, go.