It’s difficult for me to consider the swift ways of two years before my daughter graduates high school and everything in our household changes to a new normal without her. She’s a delight to have around.

I am a better person being a mother and wife. I never knew how “wanting it my own way” I was before kids. My character needed to be shaped and expanded around caring for another who was fully dependent. This wasn’t easy for me and with my second child I really started losing my mind, mostly in all things involving patience. But parenting my daughter for four years before her brother came around, I rediscovered my inner child who had gotten lost along the way to growing up, delighted in a being who thrived under such relishing, which was a joy to witness and found love in the look that said, “You’re my person.” And I wanted it to be so – ecstatic that it was. It’s been a journey, one with thankfully, little regret. (Mainly because I bought a small farm called “therapy” for ten years twice a week before I had children.)

With all the positive, it didn’t shift my need for down time and quiet reflection. I wrote this short poem(?) in reflection of some of those days as a mother of young children when they need you and I didn’t want to be needed. And oh how they need you and during these seasons there is very little space for you.

I have loved sitting on the toilet in silence better than having one more stuffie’s tea party with Raven, Siamese Kitty and my daughter who will be a day older tomorrow.

Having a teenager who now drives has oriented me to the fleeting passage of time. The ten plus hours of driving in the car together each week has been replaced by more time for myself to do what? Work, workout, or take a nap is usually slotted now. All of which I would give up to discover what music she’s now listening to because there are no more playlist take overs on our drive. And of course I could ask, but how boring compared to the experiencing. It’s like talking about a rock climbing route instead of scaling it. There also isn’t the spontaneous venting about school boredom (who actually LIKES school? Please.) or explaining the labs completed in Forensic Science. Of course we still talk. We have meals together but there is very little lingering with rowing, homework, and friendships interfering with family time.

I have loved driving you to Long Beach High School* better than the Taylor Swift concert which covered your voice.

Time is like a shooting star blazing across the sky – one moment there and the next, gone.

Be alert and watching or it will pass you by.

Happy 17th Birthday, one of my people.

(I know a few weeks late to you who this is directly written for but hey I momentarily lived in denial and thought maybe if I didn’t post about it it never happened. :-)). Here’s to me no longer living in denial.

*name changed