Independence

Today I am grateful for clean water, exercise and endorphins, safe travels, and motherhood. 

Our son Sam is moved into his dorm room, waking up there for the second morning. We are here, at home, waking up to a different feel in the house for our second morning. It is really hard and also good in so many ways to drop your kid off at college, help him move in, then drive away. 

And that's all I have to say about that right now. 

These pictures say a bit themselves though. My sister Leonice sent me them recently, after she had come across them. Sam is probably about one, and we are at my Mom's house, out at the farm. It just happens to be one of his favorite places. 

The joy of independence and attention in the glider rocker. The perplexed look of "what next?" 

Sam at one isn't too different than Sam at 18. Joy in independence and beginning life at college and away from home. And the puzzling and perplexing layers of what is to come in terms of homesickness, football, classes, pandemic, and more. 

Plenty of uncertainty, but one thing I have always been certain of since bringing Sam into the world: a parent's love for a child is like no other bond and an immeasurable gift.