Circle of Life

Saturday morning our 20-year old daughter left for the summer to be on the staff at Caswell Baptist Assembly in Oak Island, NC.

Today, as soon as he finished his last exam, our 16-year old soon will be leaving for the summer to be a counselor at Caraway Boys Camp near Asheboro, NC.

For the first time in 28+ years, my wife and I will not have children in the house.

It's going to be different for sure. We've already started planning our weekends to visit our four children and both sets of parents. They're spread out in 5 cities across 3 states (at least our parents all live in the same city!). That will be fun, but that's still only the weekends.

There's still this thing called Monday-Friday, and coming home to a house with just 2, instead of 3 or more. There's the readjustment of schedules - as in, no more school functions or soccer games, or rugby games. There's less trips to the grocery store (figuring our 16 year old being away will be a net gain in the grocery bill for sure). There's no more friends of our kids coming by, knowing our home is theirs, too. There's a hundred more things, too.

This is all okay. It also means that my wife and I get a chance to discover again that we were a couple before we were a family, and that "couplehood" is going to be the bigger part of our life from now on. It's a chance for me to work on the first love of my life (Lord knows I need that!), to tell and show her how much I love her.

So today is a day of mixed feelings and emotions.

God has a sense of humor, though, and knows how to let us down gently. On the first day after we are empty-nesters, our 28 year old has a 2 day business trip to Charlotte. Instead of staying in the hotel with his friends from work traveling with him, he asked to come home and spend the night with us.

That's way cool.