My next dentist visit is October 26th. It is a random Wednesday in October, nothing significant about it other than it is my first official Empty-Nest-Event.
The dental assistant was pleasant as I had a small crisis at the desk. "Do you want to reschedule?" Of course, thanks. "What day works?" Let me check my Daytimer.
I flipped out the October and started looking through the days, going through the list in my mind of kid's activities I still schedule around or am aware of: Voice lesson on Monday, Home Group on Tuesday, Youth Group on Wednesdays, Piano on Thursdays, random practices, earlier dinners...
Then, a small awareness. Most of these afternoons will now be free. Both daughters, tucked away in Seattle and my afternoons, without prescheduled events for the first time in twenty years. I glanced up at her. "Well," I said slowly, "It appears really any late afternoon would work." I looked back down at the date, quite alone out there in Empty Nest Land.
The whole experience possessed a surreal, airy quality, like a door had just blown open and wind had rushed in. It seemed a bit chilly but not completely uninviting, with a hint of spring but a touch of fall too.
I stood there for a moment with this sensation, determined not to get overly analytical or emotional but also quite aware of what was happening. This was the first of hundreds and thousands of appointments and moments and events to come, where there would be an untethered quality to my days, my time, my life, like never before.
And then... what?
Last Saturday, our family stumbled around Moscow, Idaho for the better part of the day, blinking in the sunlight that had finally arrived after six months of relative hiding. We gloried in the Moscow Food Co-op, rolled around in the grass on the sidelines of the soccer field, wandered through the Student Union Building on the UI campus looking for restrooms.
Later, J and I had a moment where we both knew what the other was thinking, that this was one of the last soccer games we'd be going to with our own child, that we were having a wonderful day in this random town on a random Saturday because of it, and finally, what were we going to do to keep crazy, magic moments like this alive?
There is a quality to life that happens only when you have chosen to enter something where there isn't an element of control. Sitting down and planning to go for the perfect getaway weekend with friends... it isn't the same as getting up early, driving when you don't want to and then, ah-ha! Now you see why it is you're here. There are buttercups here. And the sun, it's here. And people, our crazy little family, together. I had only wanted to stay home, and even after all of these years of surprising glory, I would have stayed, if I could have.
We are consumed with this, having control and creating the perfect life. Creating a life with limited connections, limited commitments, controlled exchanges. What is the breath of life? Jesus: "Choose trust, choose people, choose God, choose Not-My-Way-Today, and in exchange, real life, passionate living."
So what will I do at 45 with an 'empty nest?' Determine that it is always full. That we never have complete control of that schedule. That people and events and places will always be there to mess it up and make it wonderful.
I snapped shut my Daytimer. Like most days, there are things to do. My dentist is next to Value Village so off to do some thrifting. I had a haircut scheduled and was off to that next, caught up in shampoo and clippings and my hair cutter guy slicing his finger open with his scissors. Super glue, band aids, then back to work, for both of us.
I can still see that writing in my Daytimer. Out there, alone, October 26th. I wonder... what will be around it, to keep it company.
I wonder what is coming. And that feels fine.
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