Tag Archives: College

Leaving My Heart On The Curb & Driving Away

“Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.” –Kahlil Gibran

“So it’s true, when all is said and done, grief is the price we pay for love.” –E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly

Hello friend,

I had said my last goodbyes in a parking lot a few minutes before, knowing traffic would be hairy by her dorm and that I would have to stay in the car.  While my wife and son got into their seats, I had squeezed my newly-18-year-old daughter as hard as I dared and wept into her hair.  I had tried to press all the right words into her ear before it was too late and we had to let go.  Then, as we both realized there was nothing else to do, I had eased up on my hug and pressed my lips to her forehead, neither of us able to speak by that point.  So we got in the car—she in the back and me in the front–and I drove the few blocks to her dorm, the car totally silent except for my sniffling.  My eyes were fully pouring out tears as if two faucets were left on.  I knew she was trying to compose herself before she stepped out onto the curb of her new dorm, under the bright streetlights where she might be recognized by someone from her floor who might be passing by.  I pulled through the stoplight and up to the corner just past the crosswalk, not quite far enough out of the intersection for a real parking spot.  I touched the button for my hazard lights so I wouldn’t get a ticket.  Right in front of us, another family was piling out of their minivan to say their final goodbyes as well.  I smiled through my tears.  It looked beautiful to see someone else do it.  My wife and son opened their doors to signal it was time and they all got out.  I watched my daughter close the door and step out onto the curb near the back wheel.  I kept looking back over my shoulder at the three of them through the window, group hugs and individual hugs and tears and smiles over what I knew were forced jokes and my wife trying to hold it together so my daughter could hold it together.  I was there in the dark silence of an empty car watching through a closed window like it was a scene in a movie that breaks your heart because you love the characters so much and hate what’s happening to them.  I was sobbing and huffing, not really in any kind of control of myself.  After a while, when I figured they must be finishing soon, I finally composed myself just enough to push the button to roll down the back passenger window to yell one more time that I love her.  It came out all wild and fading—like monster-speak–my strength leaving me just as I felt the words begin to burst out.  I rolled it right back up and collapsed in my seat.  Then, unwilling to miss even a second, I turned back and watched them all collect themselves.  My daughter wiped her tears and steadied herself, nodding that she was ready.  They gave a final squeeze.  And just like that, she turned and began the long walk down the sidewalk to the entrance of the dorm.  I knew this was it, the moment I had been preparing her to embrace and the moment I had been most dreading for the last eighteen years.  The best eighteen years of my life.  I was blubbering, she becoming a blur through my steady tears.  “There she goes….” I whispered as my heart burst.  She never looked back.

I put the car in gear and slowly pulled away from the curb, making my way through the busy city streets in the dark night back to our lodgings.  I was hollowed out, empty, unable even to whimper anymore.  The car was dead silent as we made our way.  Some minutes later, it all rose up again in me.  Trying to keep myself together for the drive, I shook silently but violently as the tears poured harder than ever.  I knew that this is what driving would be like after this—the absence of her.

The next morning, as we turned the car away from her new city and back toward home—two full days of driving away–that profound emptiness and quiet filled the car again.  As the gorgeous countryside floated by in the sunshine out the window, inside the car it was grey and somber.  For the first time we were all fully aware that with every minute, we were getting further and further away from the glue of our family, that the empty seat next to my son was really a gaping hole in our hearts.  It would never be the same.  It all seemed so wrong, so clearly unjust.

“Why???”

That’s the word that kept coming into my mind as I drove, the word that kept agitating me.  WHY did we agree to this?  WHY does a happy family choose to separate from each other?  WHY couldn’t it have been closer, like the other families I know?  But mostly this: WHY does the best thing for her growth and her future feel like the worst thing for me?

I didn’t give over to the idea of parenthood easily.  I always adored kids, but I didn’t think I had it in me to sacrifice my passions and pursuits for the sake of others.  I watched my siblings and friends do it, and while I loved their kids, I couldn’t imagine myself fully responsible for these magical little creatures and their magnificent lives.  So I came late and begrudgingly to the decision to make a family. Then fertility issues entered the picture, leaving me wondering about whether fatherhood was in the cards for me after all.  In the end, there was no one more grateful in the world than me when my daughter arrived eighteen years ago.  I was over the moon for that girl from the first moment.  Nothing about that has changed in the ensuing years.  I redesigned my entire life around her schedule to maximize every moment.  I couldn’t bear the idea of missing anything.  And I didn’t.  For whatever amount of career advancement or accolades or social life I might have missed out on, none of it mattered even the tiniest amount compared to the joy and fulfillment of being in her world, basking in her light.  It filled my whole heart.

That empty feeling in the car on the long drive back across the land.  The even more desolate feeling in the house when we finally arrived back home.  The silence.  The utter barrenness inside me as I walked around in her bedroom.  All of that emptiness could only be filled by the sweet girl who I left on the sidewalk on the other side of the country last week.  She is the size of my heart.

Of course, I knew it was coming.  My heart has been slowly crumbling all year.  It was my resolution from the start of her senior year of high school to be present, to stay in the moment, to not be the one crying at every event and sad about how fast it was all going.  I didn’t want to risk missing all the great stuff she was doing because I was mourning her absence in advance.  And I didn’t want her feeling responsible for the care-taking of my feelings; that’s not a child’s job.  I was pretty successful at it, surprisingly.  I took in all the moments and appreciated every second with her, right up until that moment at the curb.  Maybe I was too present.  Maybe if I had done more mourning during the year it wouldn’t hurt so much now.

I don’t know how this is happening all over the world every year and people are surviving it.  How many people that I come across in the normal course of my day are absolutely shattered inside from the loss of their own hearts?  How are they doing it?  My sister texted me as we were setting up my daughter’s dorm room a few days before that awful night at the curb.  She had been through this torture with a few of her own kids and was aware of my crumbling, so she was being a good big sister and checking in on me.  She said of her first college drop-off, “I remember being almost angry that no one explained in advance how wholly gut-wrenching it was.  I was literally sick.”  Exactly!

I have been alternately trying to explain this probably-silent epidemic to myself and trying to tell a story of how my pain must be exceptional.  On the one hand, people are letting their loved ones go in different ways all through life.  I remember how shredded my wife was when she first dropped my daughter off at daycare, even though she knew she would return in a couple of hours to nurse.  After having the whole Summer with my kids every year, each first day of school has always felt somewhat tragic to me.  But also, parents are saying goodbye to their kids as they go off to the military, which is not only far but potentially dangerous.  That sounds horrible!  Other college kids go across the world for a semester or a year.  Some young adults just move out and live with their friends.  Some get jobs elsewhere.  Some get married.  Whatever the case, we get this knowing feeling that the special thing we have had with our kid is about to be forever changed.  Sure, we will have other things with them, but never this thing, the first thing.  They don’t live with us anymore.  It is rightfully devastating for any parent.

But then I try to get precious about my own pain.  I think about why mine is surely worse.  For one, in realizing how lucky I was to get to design my life entirely around my kids’ schedules, I see the flipside and how that closeness and single-mindedness has perhaps left me without alternative support systems when they inevitably go away, leaving me rudderless and adrift at sea, lost without them.  And then there is the distance thing.  I can’t help but compare myself to my friends who are dropping their children at colleges on the other side of our city or a few hours away in the next state, where they can get to them with an easy car ride if they need a hug or a family dinner.  I’m sure they are suffering, too, and I feel badly for them, but can it really be in the same ballpark as me dropping my kid on the other side of the country???  I feel singled out for this particularly brutal kind of torture.  Surely I am being punished for some despicable deed in my past.

But just when I am getting swamped in self-indulgence, I am reminded how life was not so long ago.  Once upon a time, if a kid went off to school across the country, you were left to simply imagine their life: what their room looked like, who their friends were, if they were healthy.  Hopefully they would send letters.  That must have been excruciating for parents!  Later, the phone became an option, but long-distance calls were expensive (and certainly rare in my house).  Maybe parents would send a care package, but that didn’t mean you could envision the child’s life.  That was an improvement but must have been still awful for moms and dads.  Now, with the magic of smartphones (and a compassionate daughter), at least I can get regular updates that help me to paint a picture of how she is living over there while I am sulking about her not living here.  I get texts about her classes and what she is having for dinner.  I got a verbal check-in after the first day of classes.  From her photos, I am beginning to put names to the faces of some of her new friends.  We even did a family FaceTime, which did wonders for my aching heart.  (And when she stops being so forthcoming, at least I can still follow her on Instagram.)  All of these little moments of connection and all of these details that provide color to the picture of her new world help to take the edge off for me.  It’s not just, “I live here, and she does NOT live here,” (though it is kind of like that, I hate to admit).  I’m just saying it could be worse.  I am grateful it’s not.

I’ve been back home for over a week now since that last night at the curb.  I’ve had some time for this new reality to settle in.  The Verdict: Life was simply better when she was around.  It’s too quiet now, too empty.  I hurt every time I pass by her room.  Everything reminds me of her.  My wife taped one of those giant cardboard photo heads of my daughter to her chair at the dinner table, where she used to eat and do all her homework.  It makes me smile every time I look at it, but then it also wrings out my heart like a rag.  I feel like an empty shell going through the motions in the dark, missing that thing that lit up the room and my heart for eighteen straight years.  That light lives across the country from me now.  I left it there on the curb almost two weeks ago.  And even though I am certain I did the right thing—she will learn to shine even brighter there and build her own beautiful adult life—right now I just feel heartbroken.  It turns out Love is a real beast.

How about you?  Have you ever willingly let go of the thing you love the most?  Grab a pen or a keyboard and write about a time when you agreed to allow your heart to be ripped from your chest.  Maybe the first thing that comes to your mind is a romantic break-up, but for me those belong in a different category (and they are usually better for both parties).  Which willing goodbyes have torn you apart, knowing things will never be the same?  Have you had a close friend move away from you at any age?  Have you had to move a loved one to a care facility knowing they were better off there?  Ever have a friend or roommate get married and know your relationship will be forever changed?  Have you sent someone off to the military?  If you have kids, which separations have most broken your heart?  Daycare?  Kindergarten?  Middle school?  Summer camp?  No longer driving them?  High school?  Have you gone through this college drop-off experience?  Was it as devastating for you as it currently is for me?  Does the pain just continue to grow as they form their own adult lives more and more independently of you?  Have you found anything to fill the hole in your heart?  Is the rest of life just a neverending pursuit of distraction from the pain after this point?  Do you have any advice for me?  Leave me a reply and let me know: Have you ever left your heart on a curb?

Savor every moment,

William

P.S. If this topic resonated with you today, please share it with your community.  Let’s help each other to feel less alone and to see all the ways our hearts can be filled.

P.P.S. If this way of examining your life appeals to you, consider buying my book, Journal of YOU: Uncovering The Beauty That Is Your Truth, at your favorite online retailers.  Namaste.

The Absolute Worst Time To Make A Big Life Decision…Or Not?

“Losing your head in a crisis is a good way to become the crisis.” –C.J. Redwine, Defiance

“Some beautiful paths can’t be discovered without getting lost.” –Erol Ozan

Hello friend,

I was talking with a friend last week—she’s about my age–and out of nowhere, she dropped this bomb on me: “I’ve come into a little bit of money, and I am thinking I might retire.”  She said she would like to relax, travel, volunteer–all of that stuff that we all say we are going to do when we retire.  You know: unstructured and unobligated living.  The dream.  Well, my dream anyway.  To me, it sounds like everything I have always wanted: casual, fluid, free.  The only problem: none of that sounds like her!

In other conversations, she has shared with me how difficult the first months of the pandemic were on her, as that was the time when she was not able to go into her work and have that structure, schedule, and task list that her tightly-wound personality requires.  It was a mental health struggle to be without her job (not the income part).  After reiterating that fundamental aspect of her personality to me numerous times in recent months, you can imagine my surprise the other day she when totally flipped the script with the announcement of a possible retirement.  WHAT?!?!?  I was flabbergasted.   A reasonable guess would have been that she was clinging for dear life to the normalcy and regularity of her career in these wildly uncertain times.  Nope!  Just the opposite.  After explaining herself, she at least showed her self-awareness by asserting that with all of the stressors that our whole society has been flooded with this year—coronavirus, George Floyd, Donald Trump, etc.—she probably has no business making any major Life decisions at this point.

That counterpoint flashed me back to last Autumn, a conversation I had with my niece.  She is a freshman in college, and she was by that point a few months into it and feeling very unsure as to whether her chosen school was really the right place for her.  Not sure about the people, the vibe of the campus, all of that stuff that is crucial at that transformative age that so many of us recall as a life-defining year on our journey of self-discovery.  I remember saying to her, “This is going to come as no comfort to you, but I think you may not get to have an answer to that question this year.  You may go through the whole school year isolated in your dorm room and at socially distanced meals, not going to the parties and club meetings and lecture halls that all of the other college freshmen in the history of college campuses have used to find their crowd and their niche.  You may have to wait a whole year until you can start a “normal year,” using your second year of college to learn what everyone else in history has learned in their first year.  But if it’s any consolation, all of the other freshmen in the world are stuck in this same Purgatory. How can you know if a place is right for you if you are not able to experience it as it usually is?”  I’m sorry to say it, but you may just not get to decide anything big this year.”

I mentioned that conversation to my friend the other day when she was questioning the sanity of her sudden desire to retire.  We both agreed that the crazy extremes of circumstances and emotions this year have left us feeling like our minds are on shaky ground and thus we ought to be suspicious of any major, Life-altering inclinations that flash through them.  It has become difficult to trust our impulses, knowing that everything this year has been “unprecedented”—a word used more often this year than any other—and therefore “not normal.”

We have good reason to think that when we return to that normal—please tell me it is soon—that our inclinations and tastes will probably be more like they were before.  Our current desires to overhaul our lives and the world around us will go from a boil to a simmer, maybe even to a cool.  We will almost certainly go back to the same old, same old.  Our minds and passions will go back on autopilot and cruise control.  We will quickly shush those inner voices that suggest we shake it all up, whether that shake-up is a new job, a retirement, a new health care system, or a new way of policing our cities.  Big ideas will be replaced by small ones again.  Progress, if any, will be by baby steps again.  You remember, the usual.  These impulses—whether personal or societal–that have been allowed oxygen during these “unprecedented times” will crawl back under the rock they emerged from.  If you just ignore them for a little while longer, you will get to that spot where you won’t have to be so suspicious of your inclinations.  You will be safe and boring and uninspired again.  We all will.

But should we ignore them?

What if the lockdowns resulting from the coronavirus pandemic made it crystal clear to you how little time you had actually been spending with your family and how important that time is, making you want to dramatically shift your schedule and perhaps your career path?  What if the economic crisis made you aware of how thoroughly unfulfilling your luxury car or jewelry or fancy whatever is, making you want to sell off some things and simplify, giving more of your wealth to causes that you now see truly need it.  What if the George Floyd and Breonna Taylor stories sparked a sudden realization of your privilege in this inequitable world, stirring up an activist streak in you that you had no idea existed?  What if the Capitol insurrection of January 6th and the exposure of the lies about the election fraud made you wake up to the reality of the damage your political beliefs have been doing in the real world for years, causing you to re-think not only your use of social media and usual news sources but also your political party?  What if all of these cascading crises have actually made things not more fuzzy for you, but more clear?  What if it took all of this to reveal your true values and priorities?

Maybe we haven’t had our foundation shaken but rather just had the artifice scraped off.  Maybe it took all of this drama and uncertainty to make clear who we really are inside and what we want our lives to be truly about.  Maybe all of these “out of nowhere” impulses to change ourselves and our world aren’t really so out of nowhere.  Maybe they have been at our core, our foundation, the entire time, just covered up or blurred by all of the other superficial stuff that we thought we should be doing or the speed at which we’ve been going to try to keep up with all of our commitments.  Isn’t there some quote–or at least a meme–about how life is not about finding yourself so much as it is about uncovering who you always were?  Well, that is what I am getting at.  It’s just so easy to get swept along by “normal life,” with all its busy-ness, and become numb to the signs from our soul about what is truly important to us and what resonates deep in our being.  The panic of a global health scare, the guilt and grief of knowing a loved one is dying alone in a hospital, or the graphic video of one man calmly kneeling on another man’s neck as the life force slowly goes out of him—these things have the power to shake us to a different level and perhaps expose our Truths in a way that we can no longer deny.  Trauma breeds uncertainty, no doubt, but maybe it also breeds clarity.

So, how do we tell which is which?  How do we know if that newfound impulse to switch careers or run for City Council or lead a protest march or have a baby or get a divorce or buy a bookmobile or join the Peace Corps or get a dog–how do we know if these are the insecurity of a totally shaken core talking, and how do we know if they are a finally revealed core talking?  Is there a different sound they make—a resonance—we can listen for to know if this is the thing to reject due to the extremity of the year rather than attend to because it is the revelation of our essence?  How does one feel compared to the other?

Honestly, I don’t know.  That is why I journal every day: to try to flesh it out.  I fill up my pages with the rolling of ideas around in my head, taking them from different angles, ascertaining whether and how the impulse evolves over time, questioning my motivations and scouring my psyche for insecurities or unsatisfied longings.  I attempt to look at myself in the mirror as clear-eyed as I possibly can, hoping to decipher which of these new impulses is an imposter out for a persuasive but fleeting flight of fancy, and which is my Truth revealing itself in a way that my eyes can finally see.

I think my friend is right to be suspicious of her motives for her recent, dramatic shift in outlook on her career.  Not even necessarily the motives themselves—they should be mined for lessons for their own sake—but the sustainability of her motives.  Will they keep when her job goes back to the normal that she loved for so many years?  Maybe not.  I am guessing most of our impulses and temptations from this year will not.  Most, but not all.  Truths have been revealed to us; I am sure of that.  Whether or not we will do a good job of combing through the lot to dismiss the pretenders and find that priceless gem—or whether we even allow ourselves the courage to entertain the new ideas and inspirations at all—is a different matter.  I happen believe in the power of those impulses; I think they are messages from our deeper levels.  There is Magic in there.  Sure, it must be sorted through, but true Magic is worth the labor.  That is where the marrow of Life is.  It is why, when my friend was verbally dismissing her retirement idea with, “Of course, now is the absolute worst time to be making any sort of meaningful Life decision,” I replied with, “Or maybe it’s the perfect time… .”  Maybe.  I am here to find out.

How about you?  Do you trust yourself to make an important Life change at a time of multiple societal crises and a swirl of heavy emotions inside you?  Open up your journal and try to get a sense of how steady your current grounding is to your True North?  Generally speaking, how has your mental health been in recent months compared to other points in your life when things were more “normal”?  How much more grief, anxiety, and sadness have you been dealing with this year?  Have you found your mind feeling more foggy, your senses dulled, or your motivation lacking?  Have you enjoyed things as much as you usually do, or are you one of the many experiencing anhedonia, the loss of the ability to feel pleasure?  Do you like your job as well this year as you have in other years?  Are you as engaged in your work and as fulfilled by your tasks?  With all of that considered, how confident are you in your ability to make the wisest decisions on major Life issues this year (e.g. career or location change, family changes like having a child or getting a divorce)?  How much more or less confident is that than you are in “normal” times—i.e., any time before 2020?  Have you had to make some big decisions anyway, whether you wanted to or not?  If so, how has it worked out so far?  What fresh impulses or ideas have you had in the last year around bigger changes to your lifestyle?  In what area have they popped up most frequently or strongly?  Career path?  Family life?  Health of your lifestyle?  Politics?  Spirituality?  Relationships?  How have these inclinations and impulses been different than what you have felt in other, more stable times in your life?  How do you interpret their meaning?  Do you tend to take these new tastes or ideas seriously and follow through on them, or are you more skeptical of any big idea you have during these unprecedented times?  Which new changes have you made?  Which ideas did you disregard?  Which ones will you keep on your radar until Life settles down a bit and returns to normalcy?  What is the biggest, game-changing decision you have made in the last year?  How has it worked out?  Would you have made the same decision in normal times?  Has all of this crisis, change, and chaos served to make your values and priorities more clear to you?  How will this period change your Life in the long run?  Will you be better for it, or will you carry the mental and emotional scars and be weighed down by them?  If someone came to you now who has struggled emotionally through this period and announces a major Life-changing decision, would you caution them against making such a big move given the circumstances—essentially telling them to wait it out until it is easier to be clear-headed–or are you inclined to think that these times are good for clarifying priorities and are thus a great time to make a big change?  Is your opinion on this different for yourself than it is for the general public?  Leave me a reply and let me know: Is this age of cascading crises the absolute worst time to make a big Life decision, or is it the best?

Take care of yourself,

William

P.S. If today’s letter resonated with you, please share it.  Together we can get through anything!

P.P.S. If this way of self-reflection suits you, consider buying my book, Journal Of YOU: Uncovering The Beauty That Is Your Truth, at your favorite online retailers.  Namaste.