This weekend, both of my babies are graduating from high school! I’ll admit I’ve spent the past year in denial. Raising five kids will do that to you, especially when they start leaving.

We aren’t empty nesters yet, not by a long shot, but my husband and I have noticed it is beginning to feel like we are tiptoeing into that realm as our kids grow up and live their lives independently.

It’s weird.

We now go places without making sure it is clear who is in charge while we are gone. Heck, we may or may not tell them we are leaving! Curfews are a thing of the past. They are grown. If they stay out all night and are tired the next day, that is on them. Sometimes the only sign they still live here is a dirty plate in the sink or an empty soda bottle on the kitchen table.

I miss the years when they were little and every day was an adventure. I miss the snuggles as we read books, the dance parties in the kitchen, the dress-up box that held every costume imaginable, and the treasure chest where they got to pick a surprise when I caught them being good.

I caught them being good a lot.

I still do.

Hold on, I need a minute.

This weekend will mark the end of twenty-one school years, sixteen of which included homeschooling! My youngest son will leave in August to play basketball for a school in Mississippi (Too far for my taste but what can I do?) My youngest daughter will go to college locally, joining her older sister who will be a senior. I can hardly believe we are here. They say not to blink.

I tried not to.

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You don’t have to have everything figured out. There is incredible mystery surrounding much of what we believe. Recognizing that we don’t know it all is part of the journey to maturity. The more I know, the less I know. There is a lot of comfort in that realization.

We were all created in God’s image and we are all in process by design. None of us has arrived. Learning and growing will never stop. I have said it once and I’ll say it again, if someone’s faith and traditions make them arrogant, they have missed the whole point. Read 1 Corinthians 13. Love is patient, and God IS Love. He loves you in all your messy, uncertain, sometimes right/sometimes wrongness.

Don’t be so hard on yourself.

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There is a winding road that connects my street to a highway, flanked on one side by a huge farm. Early one morning, I spotted a calf running alongside its mother, lanky legs skipping across the dew-diamond field with distant hills framing the sunrise. I still smile when I think of it.

1. Confession: I have seen the movie, Michael, three times. I just might go see it again while it is still in theaters!

2. Yesterday, I started the book, “This Homeward Ache,” by Amy Baik Lee and I’m so glad I did. Her prose is absolutely beautiful. I’m on chapter two and savoring every word.

3. I broke out an old Paul Simon vinyl, Graceland, and was reminded once again of just how wonderful the soundtrack of my childhood and teens was. (See #1 above.)

4. Quiet mornings on my screened porch are the perfect start to each day, even with the temps rising. The dogs agree, laying in various states of laziness all around me as I watch the sun rise. Sometimes they snore in harmony!

5. I try to read the Bible every day. This year, I’m using the one-year reading plan from The Bible Project. I cannot recommend it enough! The introductions to each day’s readings, along with their videos, have made working through even the most difficult books less daunting. I’m learning so much.

Ditch Days

“I don’t know if I can hold on,” I whined. My hands, inflamed after climbing the rough black plastic rope hanging from our backyard jungle gym the day before, gripped the prickly rope dangling from a bridge allowing the occasional car to drive across the irrigation ditch.

“Hurry up, Jeanine,” my brother said. “It’s my turn.”

I shot him a death-glare before studying the old brown rope in my hands. A thick knot was supposed to keep me from slipping off too soon but I didn’t trust it. Jay, spiky red hair glistening in the 110 degree heat, snuck up behind me just as I clasped my fingers together above the knot and gave me a push.

“Jay!” I yelled as I fell. The rope became taut, jerking my body and causing my sore hands to lose their grip. With a splash I landed awkwardly in the murky red water, coming up sputtering as I glared at the boys who were cracking up at my failed landing.

“I give it a four!”

“Nah, that was a seven.”

“Seven? Did you see how she flopped when she hit the water?”

More cackling at my expense as I climbed up the muddy wall of the ditch and surged toward the boys, determined to pay them back. They had already started running, but the hot pavement didn’t take long to send us all back into the water for relief.

We were fearless back then. Blissfully ignorant of the dangers we would later learn lurked in small towns like ours.

“Don’t talk to strangers,” was about as much as we needed to know.

At ten years old, I spent summers in cotton shorts and ratty tank tops. My shoulders bore the mark of a healing sunburn, skin still peeling to reveal tender white flesh beneath. Freckles popped up across my nose and cheeks daily, giving me the look of Pippi Longstocking with long, brown braids framing my face and swinging against my back as I pumped the pedals of my bike.

These boys were my brother and friends. Boys I trusted and never felt weird with. There were no jeers or disrespectful remarks when I peeled off my clothes to reveal my swimsuit. It didn’t phase them. My cheap flip-flops perched atop the pile of clothes near the bridge, waiting for me after another swim in the irrigation ditch splitting the wheat field in two.

We walked from home to the ditch dozens of times that summer, passing a mishmash of trailers and run down houses in our small Texas town. At the end of the road, we turned right in front of the elementary school and there it was. Every time. Murky water, likely riddled with bacteria and God-only-knows what else, that would cool our summer-weary bodies. Ignorance was truly bliss.

Faced had not yet begun to appear on milk boxes. None of us came from families who could afford Cable TV and the cell phone was a distant, futuristic idea.

Those were the days.

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