In one week Caroline, our youngest daughter will graduate from high school. My wife and I will earn that over used label, which illustrates the conclusion of a most important portion of the parental enterprise: we will become empty nesters.
The smell of lilacs and the warm breezes of May evoke childhood memories of the much anticipated summer vacation following a long school year. As an active celebration on the final day of school, every year, while my kids were younger, in grade school and the first year of high school, I would meet them on the playground/parking lot of the school, and set out on a day long ramble back home, guided by a predetermined route I picked earlier in the month. I wrote an essay for the Appleton Post Crescent back in 2012, a week before the final hike. Caroline was a freshman. I felt compelled to post that essay here again, 3 years later…
As we all keep moving forward, I am glad I walked with them back then, when a sanctuary of high spirited innocence abounded. There is now plenty of time for adult life to take over.
