Winds of Change

My heart just walked out the door.  It's Kaelie's LAST first day of school, which means first day of senior year for her and first day of freshman year for Hannah.  To mark the occasion, I thought I would post something that I wrote 12 years ago after Kaelie started kindergarten. 

I must have spent the entire summer in a state of denial.  My firstborn was about to start kindergarten and it didn't bother me in the least.  My husband practically broke down in tears at every mere mention of it.  "Oh, but she's so excited and so ready for it," I would say.

Then it hit me, about a  week before school was to start.  All the carefree time I had had with her for five years was about to end.  FOREVER.  That's when the guilt set in.  You know the kind, typical mommy guilt that you know is silly but you just can't help feeling because after all, it's one of the requirements of motherhood.  "Oh, I didn't do this with her.  Oh, we didn't get to do that or go there."  No matter that I had given up a successful and rewarding career and traded my designer wardrobe for spit-up-stained and sticky finger-smeared t-shirts.  I was going to feel guilty about not doing enough because doggone it, I was a mother and I was entitled to all the guilt I could muster.

I got over that.  It was the morning her daddy and I walked her to the bus stop in front of our house.  It felt like walking a plank.  Suddenly all guilt was gone and the only thing I felt was raw fear.

"What if the bus driver is a maniac?  What if she gets lost?  What if she drops her lunch tray or dawdles too long and doesn't get to eat?  What if her TEACHER is a maniac?  What if she breaks her neck on the playground?  What if someone hurts her feelings and I'm not there to take the hurt away?  What if, what if, what if..."

There she was, looking so small and sweet in her little blue and white checkered dress with the red appliqued apples ("because teachers like apples, Mommy"), the bow in her hair and the pink Barbie backpack.

And suddenly there IT was, that very large yellow bus looming before us.  She started to charge up the steps before I could even say goodbye.  She wasn't even looking back.  I had to yell her name for one last kiss and "I love you."  Then she was gone, and so was my life as I had known it for the last five years.  I hugged two year-old Hannah a little tighter and blinked back the tears.

In the days since the fear has subsided.  She comes home from school beaming with joy, and charges down the bus steps to my waiting arms as eagerly as she charged up that first morning.  She's still my baby and every day I thank God for the love we share and the arms that He's given us to wrap around each other.

Through this, God has also taught me a lesson in loosening my grasp.  Even though the winds have changed and for seven hours during the day she sails off in a different direction from me He is still with her, watching over her and guiding her all day long.

We're reminded of this in Hebrews 13:8.  "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever."  What a  comfort, Just as He is there for her at school all day, He's there for me and for all of us, whenever we loosen our grip on our lives and let Him be.