This week has been a culmination of closure and the beginning of discovering new paths in our funny, messy, adventurous life. Josh ended his preschool life today. I finish my term as co-leader of a local MOPS group tomorrow. And we will celebrate two weeks in our very own home after a one and a half year hiccup of transplanting ourselves from Austin, TX to Cary, NC.
Life, like motion, is constant change. And I have found if you keep looking forward instead of backward, you are less likely to crash. But sometimes, just sometimes, staying in neutral isn't always bad for your engine.
Josh's preschool was the biggest blessing of the year. Most people would disagree and say, "Um, didn't you just buy a house? Whoa! Huge blessing!". True. But the transformation of our son this year was close to the metamorphosis of caterpillar to butterfly: if you don't watch closely, you'll miss something magnificent.
Josh grew. Josh molted his old self of shy and insecure to outgoing and extremely confident. Sometimes, he liked to hang upside down. There were moments when I wasn't sure Josh was changing, he seemed the same on the outside. But inside, BIG changes were occurring. Little nuggets would slip out letting me know "stuff" was happening deep inside where Mommies can't always see until a word is spoken. Like, "Mommy, I know who my BFF is" he said one morning over breakfast. Smiling, I waited to hear the words, "Alex", his best friend that is moving to New Hampshire the end of May. Instead, I saw a big smile explode across his face as he said, "GOD!". Not often is Mommy speechless.
And then there were moments when he was a typical preschooler: dawdling, short attention span, long sentences that neither seem to end or have a point but at the same time extremely important that I listen intently, justifying why food is more fun to play with than eat and my all time favorite childhood epidemic - selective hearing. "When are you going to change?" I would catch myself screaming in my head. And then one day, I look around, and there is a young boy, contentedly playing cars, singing songs, chewing with his mouth closed, saying words like "proboscis" correctly (Hello! I cannot say that word), telling his sister she looks pretty today, thanking me for making breakfast, calling Daddy on the phone just to chat, and I find I have lost my breath. Here, directly in front of me is an energetic, playful, intelligent young boy, ready and excited for Kindergarten. "I will have Lunch Buddies every day!". "I will have two playgrounds at my new school!". I will ride the bus with Anna!". It is hard for me not to look back to September when I turned an extremely shy four-year-old boy over to a very loving, hilarious, patient woman who in the end returned a vibrant, happy, confident five-year-old boy. I know I need to look forward and prepare for his first day of "real" school. But for now, at this very moment, I am content to stay just where I am; a snuggly Mommy with a snuggly boy who still thinks "I know most things " ("but" he says, "you are not like Anna who knows everything!") and still lets me kiss his face in public. Sooner than I am ready, we will be shifting into forward, heading in a new direction and picking up speed. For a moment, I will look in the rear view mirror watching the road turn into a narrow, winding ribbon. I will tuck the postcards of yesterday into my joyful heart, take a big breath and smile, knowing there is another rest stop just around the bend with a butterfly waiting to be discovered.
No comments:
Post a Comment