TheBanyanTree: Empty nest

[paul]

[This bounced to me. paul]


Sean is coming home on Sunday, up from freezing Canberra, for a
fortnight's holiday.  He has one more semester of study to do and one
more graduation ceremony to get through and he'll be promoted from
Midshipman to Sub-Lieutenant and get posted somewhere.  He's hoping
eventually to go on patrol boats here and thinks that shouldn't be too
hard since, for some strange reason, Cairns is the place most people
apply for.  But before that happens I think he has to go on the big
ships and get his final bridge watch-keeping and navigation
certificates.

In all likelihood this will be the last time he will think of this
place as his home.  The last time he was here, last Christmas, he made
sure to let me know that if he does get the posting he will have Navy
accommodation, on or off base, and that will be his home.  Ah, he's
all grown up, has his own life to live and is making sure the apron
strings are well and truly cut. Good for him.

Still, this letting go is hard for me at times.  It's not as though I
would try to hold on to him.  That would be very bad for all of us.
But sometimes I see a thin young man walking up the street and he
reminds me of my boy and my heart aches.  Or maybe my husband and I
are at the video store and a couple comes in with two young boys and
suddenly all I can think of is how we used to do those things with our
boys and how all that family togetherness stuff is over for us now and
how much I miss being a mother with young sons at home who I can see
every day and who keep me busy.  What a pity, I think, that we can't
turn the clock backwards.  And then I wake up to myself.

Since his older brother moved away I've taken over Sean's old room for
ironing chores.  So I've had to move my ironing stuff out to give him
his room back for these two weeks.  We'll have a lovely time together
while he's here.  We'll go out to restaurants.  We'll go to see
Superman and look out for my brother-in-law who had a small role in
it.  We will enjoy my boy and his funny ways and he, I'm sure, will
enjoy being warm again for a while.

Then, after he's gone back, I'm planning to set up that room not just
for ironing but also for sewing.  As it is now I can't get to my
sewing machine for the boxes of stuff that are stacked around it full
of things that my husband can't bear to throw out.

My boy has his whole new life to live and I'm thinking to do something
similar.

Janice