It’s not leaving the lake that is so hard… the difficulty comes in facing the milestone the departure represents; another summer in the life of a child is closing. One step closer to the hard realities of adulthood. One step closer to losing my little guy to all day school.
Our last night at the lake, their laughter carried across the water, as they made snow angels in the sand. My hands were busy collecting laundry, picking up toys, and facing the one-million tasks that must be done before closing up and heading for home. I was too busy to catch these photos; but their laughter kept echoing, telling me, really, “to grab the kids and run for the hills before it’s too late!”
When I chose Firefly Summer as my summer read, I chose it for its title. Fireflies, summer, and childhood go hand in hand. Yet, the book was full of tragedies; so much that I found myself laughing at the irony of it all at the end. But, there was one poem that Binchy pulled in from Yeats, that captures my feeling tonight so eloquently:
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.The Stolen Child, by William Butler Yeats:
I’m terrible with all of this first day of school stuff.
Lovely post. I too am terrible with back to school. I cry like a baby every year. Last year was simply dreadful as my baby began first grade and for the first time in my life I was alone all day. I stayed in bed for a couple of days just crying after I dropped him off. I’ve already started the crying this year as my eldest will be a senior in high school, my middle a freshman in high school, and my baby a second grader. The summer has flown by and I am all too sad about it. From one mama to another, my heart reaches out to you in complete understanding.
Darn growing up!!
Really? I love back-to-school. It’s all those possibilities… a new teacher, new classmates, new experiences that I can’t set my kids up for. They get to grow and test their wings and figure out who they are and instead of hearing the fighting and snarling and frustration with each other, I get to sit back and revel in who they’re becoming and how they’re changing.
So for me, back-to-school is one exciting time of the year.