I’m halfway home from Utah after moving Colby and Leah into new apartments, stopped early for the night at a hotel at 9 p.m. because the headlight glare is too much for my 80-year-old eyes.
I’ve been happily singing along to my favorite CDs all day, but this morning as I drove past Park City the tears started unexpectedly and lasted 40 minutes. Sometimes it’s okay to sit in sadness and disappointment and feel all the feels when they’re too much. Sometimes it's okay to let the tears out and then move forward. Sometimes it's okay to share I'm human and real.
Tears because after 2.5 years of many negative tests, Covid finally hit Leah and then me and stole our last days home as a family and all the plans we had.
Tears because I can’t be everywhere, and it was hard for me not to help Colby move out of his apartment and deep clean it when he was overwhelmed. I had to pick when I could help the most, and that was to move 2 of our kids into new apartments at the same time this week, not move him out 2 weeks ago.
Tears because I can’t shrink a 20-hour car drive that separates me from family and our kids, and I can’t move us closer, and it’s too late for a lot of reasons.
Tears because I left half our kids in Utah, and the car is too big and empty and quiet coming home.
Tears because Paige leaves next, and then our house will also feel too big and empty and quiet.
Happy tears because it's exciting to see our kids adulting and who they're becoming and what they'll do with their lives, and I want them to move on and move out and thrive away from home as they should, but sad tears because I miss them and it's an adjustment for all.
Tears because of a lifetime of hard goodbyes and always feeling far away.
Tears because time marches on and people get older.
Tears because I missed Carson’s first school soccer game today (again, I can’t be everywhere I want to be…in Utah with our older kids AND at home with our younger kids).
Tears because I ran out of time for some things I wanted to do in Utah, and I didn't spend enough time just sitting with my family and soaking that in.
Tears because Colby only let me bring all his stuff into his new bedroom but not help put anything away or even make the bed, and now I’m unsettled because I never saw him settled.
Tears because I don’t have any idea what to do with the whole 2nd half of my life after kids leave home, and this transition away from full-time mothering kids at home is hard.
Tears because trials from the past few years are still hitting me, and even though I’ve accepted them and made peace with them and they’re no longer looming over me, I still don’t like them.
Tears because it’s hard to watch our kids struggle through their own challenges too.
Tears because of a pandemic, war, inflation, political divisiveness, violence and destruction, uncertainty, natural disasters, and a world gone mad. It's been a wild few years.
Tears because I’m frequently sick and my body is against me and I'm so tired of it.
Tears because I did something just for me - I met an old friend at a restaurant where we visited and laughed for hours, and it filled my soul but left me a little sad I haven’t been able to do more things like that. I didn’t realize how much I needed it.
Tears because I remembered all the plans and goals and dreams and vision I had for myself and our family when I was a student walking that same BYU campus.
Tears because I have a list of 40 things to change about myself, and I’m lost and can’t figure out who I am and my interests and hobbies and talents and strengths and worth, but I’m heading home to spend the next year finding out.
Tears because on my last night in my parents’ home, feeling exhausted from all the work of moving college students, and always aware of all my inadequacies, I opened my bedroom door to my dad hugging me and telling me he loves me. Then as he walked away, he stopped and turned around and sincerely said, “You’re a good mom.” Something in the genuine way my dad told me made me think maybe there’s truth in it.
Tears for all the other things I don’t write about.
After I cried enough, my tears dried up, I turned up music and sang along, and I'm back to seeking out and focusing on all the positive things in my life and the world, because there's a lot of good too. On some other day, these won't all hit me at once and feel as big. But today they did. Now it's time to sleep so I'm rested and can finish the big drive tomorrow.
