I get a kick out of these pictures. My Nate, practicing his ollies and kickflips and airs. … (I think all of these are “ollies” — where you spin the board 360 degrees beneath your feet and then land back on top of it.)
Go get ’em, kid. …
It actually gets a little easier each time, watching my son walk away at five-thirty in the morning, get on a plane at LAX, head to his new life 1200 miles away. …
It gets easier because I’m so proud of him, and so proud of how he’s navigating life almost all on his own now. Despite the fact he was just a little pipsqueak up to my knee just … yesterday, wasn’t it? … he now navigates all these airports with no problem, navigates his life at school, gets to his newspaper job in the middle of the night, buys his own groceries, makes his own meals. … It’s kind of an amazing thing, actually, watching your kids become adults.
And seeing them forge forward through life with resourcefulness and confidence. …
I guess those — along with your love and respect and adoration — are some of the greatest gifts you can give. …
Although I had dedicated myself to a fiction-writing deadline that stole away pretty much every weekend of November, in the middle of it all I planned a four-day weekend getaway. … Yeah. Smart move. I don’t know what I was thinking. …
Well, actually I do. What I was thinking was: I’ve always wanted to take my kids to San Francisco. Rene is a junior already. My time is running out. November and San Francisco are a beautiful combo. I can’t let their childhoods slip by. …
So, despite the writing deadlines, off to Expedia I went, to plan something fun.
And here’s the thing: No regrets. Not one.
(I wrote once before how I never regretted a vacation, and that still stands. Despite all my before-we-go worries about money and time, little trips with my family always end up making up the bulk of my memories, and will probably be with me until I’m 100.)
Anyway, why San Francisco? Continue reading
Aaaaaahhhhhh, this kid:
(Yeah, the one on the left, cracking up.)
Still my baby, even though he’s technically 13 today and (therefore) officially a teenager.
Still our joy, always making us laugh when we most need it.
Still our “happy kid” (did I mention that his dad wanted his middle name to be “Happy”? Woulda worked!).
Still that crazy kid who has a cool combination of being very laid back and very off-the-wall at the same time.
Still the smallest one in the class, though he’s shot up at least two inches just this fall alone! (Go Nate!)
Still our Nate the Great.
Happy Birthday, Baby!
Ricky (right) and friend/roommate A, ecstatic to be at the first Griz game this season. The stadium is right on campus!
So we got Ricky off on a plane out of LAX, back to his new home state of Montana. He barely looked back. …
(Of course, that might have been because we barely got him there on time.)
Here’s what happened: We screeched up to the curb at Delta about ten minutes before his flight was supposed to leave (bad us – we had all decided to do important things that day, like go see The Dark Knight together and then get In-N-Out. … we’re as bad as the teenagers …). Anyway, we screeched up; Ricky hopped out to get his suitcase; I gave him the fastest hug in the universe; Superman did, too; and then he was off! It was weird to say goodbye that way.
But really, our morning at the theater to watch The Dark Knight – all five of us, even – was the better “goodbye.”
We had a good summer with him, although his summers are made up now of mostly visiting friends and then working to earn school money. And something tells me he might not come home at all next summer – he’s settling in, it seems, in Montana. This year, he’s renting a house, has a new job at the newspaper, and has his “Montana friends.” But we’ll see.
He’s drifting into adulthood.
And we’re letting him.
It’s the thing that parents do, right?
