The College Goodbye Redux

Unlike the pre-pandemic days of seeing your kid off to college for the first time, doing it again is remarkably easier

When the pandemic hit, my son flew home halfway through his first year of university and I was secretly thrilled to have him back. Like so many parents experiencing this strange reverse migration, I cared less about his interrupted education and more about my heart, which is only fully at ease when both my kids are home.

He, of course, felt differently.

I’ve since learned that this opposing emotional experience is an essential part of this phase of parenting. And so, despite the crippling anxiety and fear that accompanied the first global lockdown, having my son home again, along with my sixteen-year-old daughter, felt like a beautiful bonus.

I’d spent the previous year wrestling with the grief of letting my son go, with everything his departure represented, while also trying to embrace his independence on the other side of the country. I’d literally just stopped my daily crying episodes and was getting used to living with me and my daughter.

We couldn’t have known that this little respite would last for eighteen months. While he was back at home, I made a concerted effort to be present and grateful for every day we were together. But as the days and months stretched out like a slack tide, I began to take for granted his comings and goings, his last-minute shouting — “Can I get a ride, mom?” — his baritone voice singing Les Mis show tunes from the basement, the cavalcade of nineteen- and twenty-year-old boys drinking and partying in my house until the wee hours. It couldn’t be helped. Eighteen months is a long time.

But now, with so many colleges hosting in-person classes again, there’s an exodus of kids moving out and back into dorms and apartments, back into their own lives. Finally. Leaving all overly-attached and slightly neurotic parents of college-bound kids like me, once again, saying goodbye. Unlike the pre-pandemic days of seeing your kid off to college for the first time, doing it again is remarkably easier. I am so grateful my son gets to start over, a third-year business student ready to take on the world after a long online hibernation.

This time, I didn’t drive him to the airport. His girlfriend had that honor, and I only had time for a quick early-morning hug as he raced out the door. I busied myself with cleaning up, working, and writing in my journal, but ultimately, you can’t avoid your feelings. For me, that means taking a good hard look at the creeping darkness that hovers over my days when I think about my life without kids at home. It means trying to rebuild my life and redefine what joy really means to me, so the void isn’t as glaring when they leave me alone.

Now, with so many colleges hosting in-person classes again, there’s an exodus of kids moving out and back into dorms and apartments, back into their own lives. Finally.

When I look back now at the eighteen-month bonus, I see my daughter, my son, and his girlfriend playing beer pong at my kitchen table with a friend on FaceTime, while I flit around the kitchen making food. Despite the uncertainty of the world outside our four walls, in that moment, there was laughter and a deep sense of comfort and peace.

I see myself on the deck with my daughter, who is reading me passages from Siddhartha, talking about the art of listening and finding meaning in a world of suffering. I see the four of us on a duvet on the floor upstairs, lit by candles, laying out goddess cards under the light of the full moon. We’ve made my reluctant and slightly horrified son join us, and we end up talking about our oldest memories, their favorite teachers, online shopping — a wide, meandering beautiful conversation made possible only by the plentitude of time and the absence of plans.

I wonder what my kids will remember when they look back on these last eighteen months. I wonder if my daughter will remember paddle-boarding in the summer evenings with me, belting out Fleetwood Mac songs, slipping into the warm blue Pacific Ocean. Or if she’ll remember instead the long, dark, despairing months of winter and online school, with nothing to look forward to. No parties, no visits from friends, being trapped at home with no focus, no motivation, and no hope.

I wonder if my son will remember anything about our time together, or if all the memories will be about the extra time with his girlfriend and friends.

For now, the precious moments of the last eighteen months are over. I hope for good. No one wants to be locked down anymore. For me, and many parents I know, I was twice blessed.

Now, it’s time to move on.

Cori Howard is a freelance writer based in Vancouver, BC, whose personal essays have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Real Simple, and many more. She’s also the editor of the anthology, Between Interruptions: Thirty Women Tell the Truth about Motherhood.