AJ and a LATTE

Words have eluded me for the past couple of weeks.  Everyone has asked me how I was doing with Keelan getting married.  I’ve smiled and said fine.  I’ve held it together.  I’ve shrugged it off like “I’ve got this.”  Everyone expected me to be a blubbering mess I suppose.

The last two days were the most perfect of days.  The kid’s new in-laws were amazing.  The venue was perfect.  Last night was what dreams and fairy tales are made of. It truly was perfectly them.  I didn’t sleep a wink.  This morning I gave up and got up an hour before my alarm.  All of the thoughts ran rampant through my head, but the one that kept resonating was the realization that K will never be back home.  When he walked out of my house yesterday at 1:15, he would never again call this home.  He’s gone.  No more slipping in way after midnight just to check on him.  No more “let me know when you’ll be home.”  No more “keep that room picked up” or “bring your glasses back to the kitchen!”  He’s gone.  That room will once again become “my” special bedroom with all of the treasures of our past–my grandmother’s bedframe, my mother-in-law’s first furniture, my rocker from my school retirement.  It will truly be a guest room.  Matt can turn our storage room for the last month back into his tv room.  I will really “have my house back”–Matt’s and my house.  Not Keelan’s house.  He will never come back home to stay.  It is no longer his home.  

Then God…don’t you just love that statement…then God spoke to me in the shower.  He washed my shock away and gave me two words.  He’s home.  His home is now with Avery.  It doesn’t matter where.  It doesn’t matter.  My home prepared him to leave.  His home is now with the woman God promised us so long ago…my daughter.  He’s home.  No, he’ll never live in my house again, but he’s home.  He is where he was always meant to be.  He is with the woman God prepared for him 24 years ago.  He is where his heart desires.  This is no longer his home…she is.  And that is good.  

I never realized until we had a child that one’s heart could live outside of the human body, but it does.  I never realized the joy, the pain, the agony, the elation that could happen with a child.  Nothing prepared me for the absolute flood of emotions I felt overnight.  EVERYTHING we have done in Keelan’s life to guide him, to teach him, to love and raise him came to a huge culmination and just like that, he’s gone.  He is still my “little boy” but he is now the head of his own family.  He is now truly grown and away from home.  All we have worked for to prepare him for this moment has come to pass.  He is really on his own with the helpmate God has chosen for him.  All of the tornados, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes cannot begin to describe the rush of emotion that has slammed into me.  I have the wind knocked out of me with no oxygen coming in, but it is good.  It is right.  It is how it is supposed to be. He is home.  He is with his heart’s desire.  

My mama heart longs for that little boy to run up and hug her with a passing “love ya, Mom” just one more time.  I want to go back and have every little moment back just one more time to remember, to cherish, to hang onto.  I want one more try to get it right…but I can’t.  That’s not how time works.  I didn’t know how to breathe without him, but I will learn.  Now, as he learns to navigate his new life, I will too.  I will learn to breathe again.  I will learn how to live with my heart loving another.  I will learn to move forward and become a “ME” I’ve never known.  He is gone, but he has brought me one of the daughters God promised.  He has given me what I couldn’t have.  He has given me so much more than I have ever been able to give him.  He made me a mom. He made me a better person. He has given me a daughter.  He is gone, but he is home.  

As I ramble and try to put into words all that is crashing within me, the tears finally fall.  They fall for all that is past and all that is to come.  They are tears of regret for what I missed and what will never be again.  They are tears of joy for what is today and what is coming.  They are tears of pride from watching him work the room of his friends and family, old and new.  They are tears of frustration as Matt and I deal with the overflow of emotions so differently.  But most of all they are tears of relief.  The tears are finally coming.  Now I fear they won’t stop.  I know they will.  I know moment by moment the days, months, years, life events will pass.  I know there will be many joys and heartbreaks to endure as K & A navigate their lives together.  There will be graduations (eventually), jobs, children (hopefully), moves, shared and missed holidays, tears of joy and tears of grief.  The tears are finally breaking loose because I know he is where he is meant to be, not with me but with the love of his life.  Being second place has never been so beautiful.

Now Matt and I have to figure out how to be Matt and me again.  All of the changes all at once have been tough on this old gal, but so much potential lies ahead.  I am so proud of the little family God has given me.  I am so proud of the life he forged out for me and the adventures that are still to come.  I cannot imagine a better life.  But today, I let the tears fall.  They are tears of every emotion and every moment of the last 23 years.  They are tears that will allow me to move forward with my heart beating in two places, but my heart has grown.  Now the heart that beats outside of my body is twice as strong because Keelan and Avery’s hearts beat as one.  He is gone, but he’s home.