Mid-CenturyModernMoms

Holiday Stress - update

So despite the pre-holiday meltdown and drama my sisters created, Jen and Becca and I had a great Thanksgiving lunch with Drew, and a lovely Thanksgiving dinner with my parents, family and friends.    I don't think it's a bad thing for two college girls to split their holiday between two sets of relatives, and I think my daughters enjoyed being with Drew's family no matter what they told their aunts. There was no drama at either  home Thursday, though my sisters...let's just say the weekend did not resemble Thursday at all....

 

Becca spent most of the weekend working!  The job she had at the mall last year -- well, she can work there anytime she wants, and she wound up taking shifts Wednesday, Friday (Black Friday shopping!), Saturday and Sunday.  Nice paycheck for that, I'm sure.    Considering that she doens't work while at school, the money will come in handy.  Of course, she made time for her  social life -- or rather, her boyfriend...

 

Jen, on the other hand, spent her time taking care of chores - like servicing her car, going to the dentist, getting her hair done -- as well as catching up with her friends.  She doesn't have a retail job around here, she's got a job at college, as a teaching assistant in an elementary school. 

 

I think Jen is starting to really understand why I ask her to call me after she drives back up to school, that there's a reason I ask her to check in when she gets back to school.  All weekend long I told her "It's not your driving that worries me, it's the morons on the road who scare me."  Sunday night, as she was driving back to school, she narrowly avoided an accident.  The car directly in front of her hit the car in front of him -- but thanks to her ABS brakes and a quick reaction time, Jen avoided hitting the other two cars.  She had to pull over to the side of the road to make sure her car was all right (and, I suspect, to regain her composure), but she drove away unscathed.  Must have been scary...

 

They just went back to school, but I am already missing my girls.  Tonight is the first night of Chanukah, and for the first time in their lives, neither of my daughters will be home for the holiday.  I sent them off to school with electric menorahs and lots of chocolate coins and dreidels, of course, but ...sigh....

 

 

 

 

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

 So both girls were home for Columbus Day weekend.

 

When I say they were "home" I mean they used this house as a pit stop.  It was just like having them here all summer...they'd pop in for a few minutes on their way to somewhere else.  Though (for reasons I'll discuss later) Jen wound up staying home a bit longer...

 

Let's start with Becca first.

 

This was her first real visit home.  Yes, she was home for the first night of Rosh Hashanah, but she didn't stay overnight -- after dinner she went back to her dorm.  And she'd gone to dinner with me, and a week later had dinner with her father in the city.  But this was the first time "home", sleeping in her own bed, seeing her friends, etc.   You should have heard the comment she made about  "showering in my own bathroom for a change."

 

Becca seems to have become a real Manhattanite.  She loves living in NYC, she's oh so comfortable taking the subway or hailing a cab.  what a difference from the girl who  insisted I go with her on the subway they day she went to summer orientation at her school.  She's loving her classes and feels like a kid in a candy store when she looks at the course catalogue.  

 

Jen was full of news.  Mostly about  incidents at the house.  I'm thankful for her male room mates, who threw out some party crashers. And they had a mystery "guest" -- someone broke into the house in the middle of the night and fell asleep on their living room couch.  The male room mates dealt with the "guest" too.  I am beginning to like the idea of Jen living with guys.  ("don't worry, mom, they have their man-cave downstairs and the girls have their bedrooms upstairs.")

 

Jen needs to call her landlord, she's got a serious electrical problem in her room.  the lights will spontaneously turn themselves off, then turn back on awhile later.  But her room mates were teasing her, telling her it was a ghost....they named the ghost "George".   "George" apparently followed her to school one day -- in her poetry class one day the overhead light turned itself off, then on, then off again.

 

While Becca is overjoyed at picking classes for next semester, Jen is a bit overwhelmed by her choices.  She has to register today, and she felt a bit rushed about the whole process.

 

She stayed home a few extra days, as I said, but not for a happy reason.  A friend of hers passed away.  The young man, who she'd known in high school, was living at home and attending school locally.  He died in his sleep Friday night, and his father found him Saturday morning.  The wake was Tuesday and Wednesday, the funeral will be on Thursday.  Unfortunately it's not the first time Jen has lost a friend.  Everyone hug your kids tonight....

 

It was good to have the girls home, if only for a few days.  good to catch up on what's going on in their lives.  good to see how well they're handling  their college careers.  But it's so clear to me how grown up my daughters are, how they're moving into their own lives....

 

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

dinner with my daughter

So I was chatting with Jen, and she mentioned that she's planning to come home for Columbus Day weekend.  that's pretty much what I expected; most students at her school leave town for Columbus Day.

 

So I asked Becca when she plans to come home, and the response was "I don' t know, I like it her."

 

And it occurred to me that my daughter is living on the island of Manhattan, an island I visit twice daily during my commute to and from work.

 

So I asked her out to dinner.

 

Now, until recently "going out to dinner with Becca" usually involved phrases like "Mom, can we go to Applebee's?" 

 

But things are different now.  Becca is a college student and lives in an apartment on the Upper West Side.  it didn't feel like taking my daughter out for a bite to eat, it felt like making plans with a friend as we discussed which night was good and where we wanted to eat.   

 

We wound up at Cafe Fiorello, a fine Italian restaurant.  From our al fresco table we could look across the street to Lincoln Center.  We shared an order of fried shrimp and calamari, Becca had filet mignon (she took half of it home for lunch the next day)  and I had an excellent veal marsala and a glass of a very nice chardonnay.

 

And we had a long chat about what's going on in her life, how much she's loving colege and enjoying living in NYC, what classes she likes and what she's planning to study next semester (her school has a heavy-duty core curriculum, which doesn't leave much time for electives).  She seems to be getting along with her room mate and apartment mates -- there are minor issues, such as the level of cleanliness in the apartment -- my daughter doens't like to see dirty dishes left in the sink, especially dishes that belong to her but were used by another girl).  but for the most part, she's happy with her apartment mates, happy with her curriculum, happy with her decision to enroll at this school.

 

She had a fleeting moment of regret -- her campus is in Manhattan and looks like everything else in that borough, very urban and modern, and when she visited the school's main campus (in one of the outer boroughs) and saw a much more traditionally collegiate atmosphere, she briefly wondered if she made the right decision to enroll at the sattelite campus, but that feeling passed quickly because she truly loves to be in the  heart of the city.

 

After dinner we walked over to the local grocery store (you simply cannot call it a "supermarket" in Manhattan!) and she stocked up on a few essentials.  She was limited to what she and I could carry, of course.  (She's planning to come home for part of Columbus Day weekend, and the plan includes a trip to a real supermaket followed by a car ride back to her dorm.)  It is, after all, a mother's job to make sure that her daughter has enough to eat -- considering how "awful' the campus cafeteria is. 

 

I took my daughter home to her dorm.  And then, I went home. 

 

Wow, what a powerful statement.  My baby does not live with me anymore.

 

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

college update

"...it's late September and I really should be back at school...." (five points to the person who recognizes that lyric)

Well, it's that time of year again -- the time of year when every conversation with one of my daughters must always include the question "Mom, can you put money in my bank account?"  Yep, the National Bank of Mom is once again open for business.

Jen has settled into the school year very nicely.  but that's to be expected, it's her junior year, and much of her school routine is old and familiar.  Her new adventure this year is living off campus and finally having a room of her own, one without a sister or roommate.  Of course, that means she has to cook for herslef (no more dining hall) and she has to leave herself time to get to class (no more rolling out of bed and into a classroom, it's a 20-minute drive to school).    She's completed most of her required core courses, though she is taking her lab science class this semester, and most of her program consists of  courses in her major and electives.

Becca has taken to college life like a fish to water.   She loves everything about it!  Her on-campus housing is not a traditional dorm; rather, the housing is set up as apartments complete with full kitchen.  Freshmen are required to be on a meal plan, but the food in the cafeteria is less than wonderful, so she's learning to shop for and feed herself -- though she did have to call home to leanr how to make a cup of tea when she didn't have access to a microwave.  she loves her classes, and has already told me how much she appreciates some of her high school AP teachers -- she feels they did an excellent job of preparing her for college.    And I love to hear her talk about the city -- in a matter of three weeks she sounds like she's been living in the city her whole life.  She oh-so-nonchalantly describes taking the subway to visit her best friend at another university, or how she and a few freidns went to Lincoln Center and sat outside the opera house listening to Carmen and eating gelato, or how they walked around the Village or went out for sushi....

I finally got to hear all the details about the room mate who moved out....I thought it was the girl from Florida, but it turns out, the girl who moved out is from New Jersey.  Apparently the young lady really didn't want to live on campus and her parents pushed her.  She started crying and carrying on about being homesick the day she moved into the apartment, almost from the moment her parents left.  She was gone within two days, having converted her status from "resident" to "commuter", and she'll be travelling to school from New Jersey every day.

I feel bad for the girl, of course....but Becca was in a "forced triple" bedroom (a room designed for two but with a third girl squeezed in), and now she's in a double.  I can't feel bad about that.  Guess it's all part of the college experience.

but my girls are doing well, enjoying their busy lives as college students. 

and I'm getting used to the quiet in the house.

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

L'Shanah Tova!

 It's going to be a weird holiday. As a divorced parent I am used to split holidays,  my children periodically absent from my family table.

 

But this is different.   This isn't about custody and visitation and all that goes with it.

 

First, let's talk about Becca. She's living in a dorm now, and she's a freshman, so she feels she can't miss class.  She'll be home for Rosh HaShanah dinner -- she can either come home by train, and she can catch a ride back to the dorm with my sister who lives in Queens.    So she won't be sleeping in her own bed, she'll be leaving at the end of the evening.  I can live with that, I suppose.

 

But Jen....well, in previous years she'd come home for the holiday, make arrangements with her professors to make up the work she'd miss in order to celebrate the holiday. But today is the very first day of classes at her school.  "Mom, I can't miss the first week of classes, I'll never catch up!"

 

So she's not coming home.

 

Sigh.

My baby is grown up and on her own.  

 

My best wishes for a sweet and happy New Year to all.

 

 

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

one down, one to go

Becca moved into her dorm last Friday.  It was chaotic and emotional.  But I knew it would be.

When Jen moved into her dorm freshman year, she had me, her father (my ex) and Becca to help her. Her school is in New England, about a 4 hour drive away from our  home on Long Island.  but Becca goes to school in Manhattan, so she had an entire entourage --her father, her sister, three aunts, a family freind and her mother (me) -- to help her move in.   And she brought enough "stuff" to outfie the whole dorm, I think. 

Her first full day of college life was spent in a volunteer program, a group of students went to Harlem to plant a garden.  then they had a "cultural experience" in chinatown, visiting a Buddhist Temple and eating dim sum in Chinatown.

The students who did not participate in the volunteer program moved into the dorm Sunday.  When I spoke to Becca she was gushing aobut her new room mates and how she loved them already.

They had two days of orientation, and today is the first day of class.  I will be interested to know if she's still gushing after today.  when we visited the school last spring she looked at the course catalogue and saw hundreds of classes she wanted to take; I hope she's enjoying.

It's so werid to say that my daughter Becca is away at school and my daughter Jen is still home with us. 

Jen is in a frenzy of packing.  She's driving up to school on Labor Day.  She told me that she doesn't need help moving into her house.  She's sure that everything she wants to bring to school will fit into her car, and she's used to the drive north.  She doesn't want her mom to go to the real estate broker with her to pick up the keys, she wants to do it herself.  She's got lots of friends to help her carry her things into the house.  She tells me that none of her housemates willl have a parent helping them move in, either.  She plans to invite me and her father up in a few weeks to see the house, take her out to dinner, etc. 

My baby doesn't need me anymore.  At least, not in the way she used to.

Sigh.

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

the final countdown

Becca moves into her dorm in just two days.  In just two days she begins her life as a (semi) independent adult. 

She's actually moving in a few days early.  Her school solicited volunteers for various community srvice projects -- New York City is filled with such opportunity, and her school emphasizes "social justice" and education of the entire person.  she moves into her dorm Friday and participates in a service project Saturday.  On Sunday, when all the other freshmen will be moving into the dorm, the students who participated in the community services projects are invited to a brunch.  Orientation starts on Monday and classes start on Wednesday.

The other reward, of course, is that she gets to pick which bed, desk, dresser, etc. she wants....of the 8 girls living in her apartment, only one other  girl has volunteered for community service.

Yes, 8 girls in one apartment.  It's really meant for 7 girls, I think, but they've added an additional bed. the school guarantees housing for all four years of undergraduate education, and let's face it, in New York City most sutdents can't aford to move off campus and commuters are usually living with their parents.  It's got three bedrooms and two bathrooms, a living room and a kitchen, so it won't be too bad...I reminded Becca that Jen's freshman dorm was a traditional dorm, force tripled  (three girls in a  room originally designed for two) with the bathroom down the hall and shared by the entire floor.My freshman dorm was a suite -- three bedrooms, suite room and one bathroom, shared by 6 girls.  It's all part of the college experience.

It will be weird having Jen home and Becca away, I'm really used to having Jen away at school and Becca still at home.  In the overall scheme of things, Jen's college starts "late" -- her first day of classes isn't until September 8. She's liiving off campus this year, there are 5 of them renting a beach house about 20 minutes away from the school.  It's a 5 bedroom house.   The three girls have the upstairs bedrooms, the two guys have the rooms downstairs.  I must admit I had qualms about Jen moving off campus; although she's headed into her junior year, she's still only 19 years old.  But I've known since her orientation that the culture of her school ....well, there's very limited dorm space and there is a lot of affordable housing off campus, and most people move off campus by their junior year. 

Not to mention her choice of housemates....I am sure many parents would absolutely forbid their daughters frrom sharing a house with male classmates.  I am more than a bit nervous about the arrangements...but when she asked me,  I took a deep breath and co-signed her lease. 

And my daughter has her act together, she handled the real estate broker, the lease, arranging for utilities, etc. like a pro.  I look at Jen sometimes and wonder who this competent and mature woman really is, and what did she do with my little girl?

So...in just a few short days my nest will begin to empty....

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

the inexorable march of time

so Becca's college prep continues...filling out the financial  aid forms, registering for classes, obtaining medical forms, getting her housing assignment and room mates...

it's not as intense for Jen, she's going into her junior year and already registered for classes, but there's prep for moving into her off-campus house, things to buy, arranging for utilities...

I should have a count down ticker .. a clock ...something...to amrk off the days....

the days until each girl goes off to college...

and I have to deal with the empty nest.

time for a few changes, perhaps?  maybe it's time to get serious about the gym... volunteer for a political campaign....something else to fill my time?

nothing too drastic, of course.

not like my neighbors.....

they have two sons, one who is a college senior and one who is about to start his freshman year.  I found out last weekend that they just sold their house and bought a condo, and they're planning to move a week before the boys head off to school.

but still, I'm contemplating the possibilities....

Visiting Day

Rosie has been away at camp for a month- with another month to go.  It's her last summer as a camper.  And she is determined to eke out every last iota of enjoyment from it.

But last week I got to see her and give her a hug.  It was visiting day at camp.  It's the end of first session and the kids that stay both sessions (as is mandatory for these oldest campers) get to see people from outside- and more importantly, they get to go out of camp themselves.

There is a tradition at this camp.  Take the kid to Wal-Mart and re-stock up on junk food and anything else that the kid needs.  Not too bad a bill this year.  And give hugs to all of your friends that you see at the store (as if you hadn't been living with these people!)  And then go to one of the two Friendly's for lunch (ditto on seeing the camp kids) and then go to the local homemade ice cream stand (moo).

So we did all that.  And walked around the area that her group is bunked in and got to see her own section of it.

Mom got a huge hug at the beginning of the visit.  But by the end, Rosie was off and running to her friends.

And three weeks to go.

graduation time

On Sunday Becca will graduate from high school.  There will be a ceremony at the high school, she and her classmates will wear cap and gown, and we will listen to speeches and musical performances.  

I will be in tears, my baby girl will be a high school graduate.  

I am already in tears over the family drama going on.  Let's just say no one is happy, no one wants to compromise and I am in the middle with everyone mad at me.

But on Sunday my baby will graduate.  On Sunday I will put on a smile and be oh-so-proud of my little girl.

She'll be headed off to college soon.

They say you should give your child roots and wings.

I hope I've done both.  

Can't wait for her to stretch those wings and see where she flies.