Adrienne moved into an off-campus dorm today. A cute little shared-living apartment she shares with a sorority sister and three other kids.
I’m a little bit in shock. Not that she left, but that she’s gone. Not far–less than 10 minutes away. But she’s not here. She doesn’t have a bed here. Her clothes aren’t here. Her things aren’t all over the bathroom.
For the first time since I was 20 years old, I won’t know where she is every minute of everyday.
Sure, I’ll have an idea. I have one now. But it’s so strange. Surreal.
So, I’ve been thinking all day about her and moving out, and remembering being 19. I’d already been out of school a year and given up college to stay home with my brothers while my step-mother went to graduate school. My dad was just out of prison. It was chaotic and uncomfortable. I was needed at home, but there was no sense of pulling together to get things done. The last four years at home were a nightmare, with my dad gone. My step-mother hated me when she was home, which wasn’t very often.
I actually have no idea if she’d agree about hating me. Probably not. But it felt that way, and that mattered a lot.
What is true is that we didn’t have enough to eat, enough supervision or attention. There was no sense of safety or security.
I spent that last year in a tug of war with my step-mother. I wanted to go. She needed me to stay. I was afraid my brothers would end up in foster care if I left. So I stayed until my dad came home.
The night I left, my step-mother was off somewhere, and my dad told me I should go while I had the chance. It was about midnight. I ran away. I only had one goal: to never, ever live there again.
And then a couple years later, when Adrienne was born, I had another one: to make sure my little girl never felt the need to run away as a survival mechanism.
It meant a lot to me, probably more than she’ll ever fully understand, that Adrienne has wanted to take time moving out, rather than jumping ship the first chance she had. That she wants me to make sure we have family dinners once a week. That she wanted me to go with her when she went grocery shopping for herself for the first time.
I vividly remember the first night I lived away from my parents. My best friend picked me up in the dead of night. I had some clothes and books in a duffel bag, and I moved onto her couch.
I lay awake that first night, and I felt like a refugee.
I want my girl to spread her wings. And she is. Beautifully.
But she’s also a semi-homesick college freshman, and not a runaway breathing freedom for the first time.
And that’s beautiful, too.
