Change is Good

Tomorrow is officially Fall Registration day for continuing students at NWTC.  For me, this means registering for the last few classes for my program.  By the end of December I will officially hold an Associate’s Degree in Paralegal Studies.  Looking at the Fall class schedule yesterday to choose my classes I realized that I really don’t have much “choice” as far as classes go.  I have to take the few remaining courses left to obtain my degree in my program.  It’s hard to believe that time passed so quickly, and suddenly here I am wondering how I will fill my free time without homework.  Wondering if my conversational skills will become weak without all of those classes to stimulate my mind.  Not only the legal courses, which help me to often analyze life situations, TV shows and news programs, but also those general education classes which improved my communication skills, helped me to understand the economy and form my own opinions on economic policy, and of course taught me to translate math “story problems” about things like gears and pulleys.  (I honestly should use the strike out feature through my comments about math.  I still cannot decipher a story problem to save my life.  I sure wish those books would use life examples I could relate to – maybe ask me to calculate a 35% discount off of a $69 pair of shoes and I would understand!)

Lately I find myself having to hold back from thinking too far ahead into the future.  This semester is not even over and I still have piles of homework to do and final exams to take. And let’s not forget that before I graduate, I have to focus on my twin sons who will be graduating from high school in less than two months!  This week has been a particularly rough one for me emotionally and it’s only Tuesday?!! Yesterday started out booking a hotel room for Cody’s “accepted student visit day” at Milwaukee School of Engineering this weekend. Despite all of the life skills I have in addition to my academic smarts, I still find myself with some form of adult attention deficit disorder when it comes to booking hotel rooms.  I blame it on the internet. I have always said if you give people too many choices, they will always have a hard time making a choice.  A standard Google search for Milwaukee hotels seems to bring up about 584 results, which you can narrow down by location and price.  I am still second guessing myself for booking a hotel that was further away from downtown but with a more reasonable price!  My husband’s voice must have been in my head when I was doing this telling me if we are paying $200 per night... we are only staying one night OR we are JUST NOT paying $200 per night! My husband, who was not even going to go along, but decided at the last minute that maybe we should all go. The more I thought about it, the more I had to agree, though when he expressed “concern” about how expensive this was going to be, I reminded him of what he said when he decided to go.  This might just be the last time all five of us spend an entire weekend together – just the five of us (without friends, significant others and into the future – spouses, grandchildren).

Then last night was an appointment with another recruiter for Mack.  I believe he has finally decided on the Air Force.  In the recruiting office was a girl who actually went to high school with the boys and graduated last year.  She just finished up boot camp and tech school and was home on leave.  It was really good to talk to someone who had just gone through it and had the experience fresh in their mind.  As a mother, it gave me reassurance.  Though I found tears rolling down my eyes with the realization that I won’t have contact with my son for that time, something I cannot imagine considering the longest separation I have ever had with any of my children was my recent vacation, but then I was able to message them everyday on Facebook. I asked the recruiter if I could write letters to him while he was there, and he said “everyday if you like.”  I told Mack I would write him a personal blog every single day, and I intend to. 

Remembering when the boys were little, I recall sometimes thinking I would not be sad when they grew up and went away.  Not because I wanted to get rid of them, but because when you are a parent of young children, you often look into the future and think you will be proud of them, and strong enough and ready to let them go.  Now I know that is a myth.  As a mother, you probably never will be ready to let them go.