Fits and Starts

I don’t know if you noticed, but my leap of faith seems to have landed with a mighty thud. No sooner did I post my first blog, believing that it would be easy to write and post two or three times a week, than my college-bound daughter, who had been barely visible for three months, decided she needed me.

My daughter, Courtney, is the younger of my two daughters. Lindsay left for college in 2006, now it is Courtney’s turn.  With my nest already feeling empty last month, I thought it made sense to start my blog before Courtney really did leave, to make a commitment not only to find a new focus for the next phase of my life, but to share my journey in the hopes that others on their own new journeys might also share with me.  I guess I was looking for a sense of community.

But then, just when I thought motherhood was winding down, there was that final call—the call to shop, organize and, best of all, hang. Over the past month, Courtney and I spent more time together than we have in months. We made three trips to Target, two trips to T.J. Maxx, and countless trips to the basement for boxes, suitcases and bags. We moved everything she planned to take into her sister’s semi-empty room. When that room overflowed into the hallway, I tried (like many brave mothers who have gone before me) to explain to Courtney that she might not want to take everything with her all at once as those college rooms aren’t exactly renowned for their spaciousness. (In the end, she took most of it and it fit—barely.)

When I got home from work at night, we watched all her crazy reality TV shows before I went to bed and she headed out for the evening. When she requested a ‘marathon Gilmour Girls night,’ the week before she left, I knew she was saying good-bye in her own special way. This was our show—the one we watched on TV until it was canceled, and then again and again on the DVDs I purchased. A story about a mother and daughter who were close, just like us.

Last weekend, my husband and I moved Courtney into her into her dorm—an apartment downtown Chicago.  My sister lives only a few miles away, and she and my husband were my strength through two days of physical and emotional stress. (I will write more about that in the next few days.) As we drove away from Courtney’s apartment building, I thought about how I so easily put my blog, my friends and everything else on hold so that I could spend every free moment with her. I wouldn’t trade a second.

So today I return. I drag myself back to the blank page and start again. With my journey. With my blog. Because that is what life is like; progress comes in fits and starts.