Empty-Nest Parenting
Re-learning how to be my kids’ mom from a distance
I’ve run into the grocery for literally one item — a mega pack of toilet paper that I am trying, unsuccessfully, to tuck under my arm. I’m in my sweats. From yesterday. With yesterday’s hair and no memory of the last time I looked at myself in a mirror.
Cameron’s mom beams at me from the far side of her shopping cart that’s so full I’m not sure how she’s making corners. Fluorescent light bounces off the mounds of juice pouches and foil-lidded yogurt cups she’s hauling, making her face glow. I haven’t seen her since Max, my youngest (of two), and Cameron, her oldest (of many), left for their respective colleges, about a month ago.
“How does it feel to have an empty nest? Can you believe you’re done?”
I should have a reply by now.
So many people ask about my empty nest like my job as a mom is over. Yes, my kids are past 18, and, legally, I’ve been made redundant. I’ve found no books, magazines, or unsolicited advice for this stage. Is that why?
Did the sidewalk end?
I swear, minutes ago I was dragging my little chubby-cheeked boys through Old Navy, looking for picture-day sweaters, and then scrambling after them when they slipped under the dressing room door and disappeared into the messy racks of clothing. They were always quick to bolt but never went far, coming back for food and toys, hands and hugs.
I blinked and they were at the mall with their friends, getting their first taste of independence, exploring every artery of the miniature city. They bought soft pretzels and bubble tea with birthday money that’d been burning holes in their pockets. My phone buzzed with texts asking if they could get clothes with the credit card I gave them for emergencies.
Today, Max is thrifting for shirts between college classes. He calls to ask if flannel shrinks in the wash. Noah, my oldest, is sipping chai and choosing bolts of fabric in a tiny shop in India, where a tailor takes measurements for his kurta and a cobbler traces his size 13 feet on notebook paper. He FaceTimes me wondering whether black sandals are more practical than brown.
How does it feel to have an empty nest?
Can I believe that I’m done?
Done with what? What is the it of parenting? Holding, rocking, comforting, nourishing, helping, guiding, finding, asking, reminding?
I remember what I thought parenting was when I was a kid.
Photo albums were the one thing I wanted to save in a fire. I spent lazy Saturdays studying their pages like Judy Blume books, reliving my childhood while still in the middle of it.
The time my mom helped me bake a cake for our dog Flower’s birthday. The time my dad hoisted me onto his shoulders so I could see the bird’s nest in our tree. The time my parents drove us in our wood-paneled station wagon 10 hours to the beach.
I became a parent in the age of digital pics. All memories of raising my kids live in the sky. I have little proof of their childhoods — half-peeled-off stickers on a bedroom door, wood flooring scuffed by cleats that weren’t supposed to come inside, the skeletal remains of a secret hideout in our dying ash tree.
Now my kids travel through streets in cities, countries, and continents, far beyond my reach. And I’m standing in the grocery store, embracing an obscenely large package of toilet paper, staring at Cameron’s mom — Liza? Lisa? Leena? — trying to answer her question.
Then I get a text that says, “Hey, Mom–how do you make a baked potato?”
Karen Scholl is a writer and recovering soccer mom living the dream in a flyover state. Her humor book Surviving Soccer: A Chill Parent’s Guide to Carpools, Calendars, Coaches, Clubs, and Corner Kicks is forthcoming from Triumph Books.
