09-08-99 Eastern Echo

Beginnings, endings-hand in hand they go. This fall there are so many beginnings and endings in my life I'm not sure if I should feel elated or melancholy. For my second child, it is the beginning of his school career-kindergarten and the chance to ride on the big yellow bus his sister has taken for two years. I'm relieved to finally have two of my three children in school, albeit only half-days for my son, but still I feel the pangs of loss most mothers feel when they must step aside and watch their child make one of those first faltering steps toward self-reliance. In a small corner of my mind I hear that voice of un-reason whispering, "Soon they will not NEED you so much anymore." Silly. They will always need me, but then I know my role in my son's life will change with each step he takes into the world without me, and each step will leave me one pace farther behind. The road to self-reliance must be paved with mothers' tears, or so I think at this vulnerable time when beginnings and endings come fast and hard. My son, in all his glory. Austin, being the second, and middle child, will likely suffer all the psychological damages the "experts" say that his birth position creates. Seldom the first to do anything, often overlooked because the youngest requires immediate attention. Somewhat of a complex child, we didn't know how to handle his outbursts or his sullen pouting. Comparing our situation to any of our friends with "difficult" children, they all claimed to have one child whose perplexing behavior far exceeded what we were dealing with at the time. We found no solace in their commiseration. The "rag-doll" temper tantrum was Austin's specialty. Mouth screwed to a tight right curve, eyes squinting in rage (or disappointment), the bones in his body would suddenly dematerialize in the blink of an eye as he crumbled to the floor in a wailing bundle of flailing arms and legs. Our initial amusement at such a display was quickly replaced with mounting frustration as this "phase" lasted a full six months. Luckily, I just happened to have a video camera handy during one of his most magnificent "rag-doll" performances. We'll show it to the first girl he brings home for us to meet. Revenge, while sometimes long in coming, is always sweet. Watch out for that wall! Austin learned to ride his bike without training wheels before his older sister had mastered it. To my husband and I this feat seemed remarkable, since Austin had found a way to fall down, bump his head, or smash a finger every day of his life from the moment he could crawl. We laugh about it now, but those days when he would run around a corner in the house and bump his head against the wall at the turn seemed like they'd never end. The funny thing was, one such bump actually made our lives easier. An evening like many others was passing with my husband and I sitting on the floor watching our two active toddlers run pell-mell around the living room. Austin clambered up on the couch, and daringly stepped onto the arm of it, his skinny arms held out to the side, balanced like a tightrope walker. And like Humpty Dumpty, he fell with a crash directly on top of his head-little arms, body, and legs, tumbling after. I wasn't thinking of all the king's horses and all the king's men, I was visualizing intensive care. I thought he had broken his neck. It wasn't a broken neck, but something happened after that fall that we cannot explain; his rag-doll tantrums miraculously ceased. We still joke that each time he goes through a particularly awful stage we should just drop him on his head. When "funny" crosses the line&ldots;.. Annoying humor was a talent that Austin used indiscriminately. From mimicking his sister's every word and action, to knock-knock jokes with no punch line, he had the repertoire of a master. Austin decided to teach younger brother Parker some annoying humor. "Hey mom?" He would innocently ask. "What, Austin?" I'd reply. "Nothing." (In a sing-song nasal tone.) Parker, being a quick study, eventually became the jokester of the house offering this phrase at every unexpected moment. One night as I lay in bed beside Parker, trying to prompt him to sleep with my (obviously) pretend snoring, Parker's voice took on a frightened resonance, "Austin?!" he gasped. "What Parker?!" replied Austin as he sat upright quickly in his bunk bed, nearly bumping his head on the ceiling. "Noth-ing." Parker's self-satisfied voice rang clearly in the darkened room. A heavy sigh emerged from the darkness above. "I wish I had never taught-ed that to him sometimes." We laughed till our ribs felt like they would split, until their father finally came upstairs to see what all the ruckus was about. Getting ready for the big day. On the first day of kindergarten, Austin was up with his sister as she readied herself for the morning school bus. As a second grader with so much worldly experience, she was not wide-eyed and nervous about the first day of classes, but Austin was. Since he was enrolled in afternoon classes he had hours to wait before he could launch himself at this new experience he had been anticipating since kindergarten roundup in May. An hour after his sister left for school he was sitting on the front porch, new backpack over his shoulder, his face split in a rictus grin of eagerness. We counted down the hours (and minutes) until it was time to stand at the end of the driveway, watching for the long-awaited big yellow bus that would sweep him away into a whole new world of independence. I watched his excitement with a detached wonder. Was this the end? Would he never be my little boy again? Now I had to share him with the larger world, and its influence on him would gradually surpass that of my own. It was a moment of beginnings and endings. Time to go. The bus trundled around the corner, bringing with it a new world that reached for Austin with hungry enthusiasm. I saw the end, he saw the beginning. When the bus lumbered to a stop at the end of the driveway he stepped forward, excited by the endless possibilities that awaited him beyond my reach. I watched him go, knowing what was ahead of him, and me. It wasn't easy, letting go of the little boy who I can still (barely) cradle in my arms while we sit in the lazyboy chair. He had to go. And I had to stay. Nothing could've stopped it, not that I would have wanted to. It's the way we grow. And yet I still can feel the delicate pressure of his tiny fingers that I held in mine only a moment after I pushed him from my body over five years ago. It's just that I wished he hadn't let go of my hand so easily when the door to that bus opened up. I wished he had asked for just one more hug. I needed it. �