As my kids have grown, I write less about parenting. Their stories are their own; they never asked to have a writer for a mother. (I also know heaps less than I did when I started parenting, HA.) But raising them is the holiest labor I know. The hardest calling I’ve been given. And the one I’ve prayed for the most.
My oldest turns 16 this weekend. I wrote this essay months ago. Now this stage is already over. But oh, the wonders (and worries) of the freedom he gets to taste now.
Parents often lament that time is a thief. I can only ever call it a gift.
Does he know I’m only fifteen in my mind’s eye, too? Fresh permit in my pocket, sweaty hands clenching the steering wheel, terrified to accelerate to 70 miles per hour, just like that interstate merge he eased with confidence?
Does he know it feels like clichéd-yesterday when we buckled him into his brand-new car seat at the hospital, when I crouched next to him in the backseat for the whole drive home, hovering over his six-pound body in disbelief that the nurses let us pull away from the parking lot without a single professional in tow?
Does he know the world is full of terrible drivers, over the limit and under the influence, speeding or texting or racing or chasing? Does he know every road can hold sharp curves or slippery ice, traffic jams or jack-knife crashes, detours or dead ends?
Does he know I’m pressing my pedal-less foot to the floorboard every time he brakes?