FRESHMAN SURPRISE

I had come to peace with the fact that Taylor was right – she belonged at school her third weekend up there, she needed to stay and make more friends and adjust. And once I had owned that I was acting out some tired old dysfunctional part of my life and not dealing with the reality of the situation, I relaxed and let it all go.
I went ahead and planned the weekend without Taylor in mind. We bought tickets to take Lucy to see MARY POPPINS on Broadway. I got a facial on Friday, did a little retail therapy in the form of a new Lanvin bag and some jeans. And decided I would spend much of the weekend hanging with Lucy and preparing for Blake’s memorial this week. It was plenty to keep me busy and I wanted to catch Michael Moore’s new film too.

Friday night Glenn went to a business dinner so Lucy and I decided to just “chill” and eat dinner home and watch a movie. Perfect night: chicken, mac and cheese, watching WHEN HARRY MET SALLY with my fourth grader.

I thought Lucy would love it as much as I did and still do. Her favorite films last year were DEFIANCE and THE WRESTLER; she loves most all films. This year she was only bored by VALENTINO except when the pugs were on and one doc I took her to about the Partition between India and Pakistan. OK, she wasn’t crazy about SEPTEMBER ISSUE.

But she tends to like everything from the Jonas Brothers to THE QUEEN. I was sure she would adore WHEN HARRY MET SALLY.

I was wrong. She kept waiting for something to happen: “There is a lot of talking, when will they do something?”

She thought it was really old. I thought it held up really well until I got a little upset when I remembered Bruno Kirby had died and ran to GOOGLE to remind me of what and when – leukemia at fifty-seven. He was so funny.

But my favorite moment was when Lucy looked at me in the middle of the film and said “They had Evian back then?” Yes Lucy, way back in the late eighties they had Evian. When the computer came on, big clunky thing that it was, I said, “See we had computers too.” She said, “ Yeah, but you could only type on them.” OK, so we couldn’t SKYPE but we got by.

You’d think we were watching BIRTH OF A NATION.

We were halfway through the Michael Jackson tapes special when the doorbell rang.

Odd since in our building you aren’t allowed upstairs unannounced. But the doorman knew the person, Taylor had taken the six o’clock Acela to surprise me.

HAPPY.. HAPPY…HAPPY….Big hugs, big surprise. Some days life turns out just the way you want it to.

We ordered pizza from Serefina, opened a bottle of wine and there she was, my freshman, full of stories and enthusiasm for her classes and all the things she was learning and doing, and she was going to a Malcolm Gladwell lecture next week, and a concert at the Berklee School of Music. And it was so good to not only have her home but also see the transformation that has taken place in only three weeks.

And then it was like she had never left– clothes on the floor, cups on every surface, her snuggled in her nest bed carrying on multiple conversations on Facebook and her Blackberry with old friends and new. Lucy and the dogs were so thrilled to see her they were snuggled with her and our wonderful Salva called to see if she had in fact come home. I think Salva had a lot to do with it; she had been calling her for days.

Salva deserves a blog of her own, which one of these days which I will do. I’ve been waiting my whole life for Salva. My friend L sent her to take care of us and she does an amazing job.

So there we were our little family back together. I turned off my Blackberry and went to sleep.

Lucy had drama class and her friend Charlotte coming over the next day. So Tay and I did what we do: we had lunch at our favorite restaurant, shopped – but of course – she needed some dresses for college. She wasn’t planning on people wearing dresses to class.

She caught up with some friends and Glenn, amazing husband that he is, took Lucy and Charlotte to see MARY POPPINS so I could take Tay to see the Michael Moore movie and to our favorite restaurant for dinner. Taylor didn’t want to spend her Saturday in New York watching MARY POPPINS. And according to reports Glenn liked it more than the girls did. I think Lucy might be channeling A.O. Scott this week or something.

But now that Taylor goes to a school where she is minoring in film and everyone there knows everything about it we can have long discussions about what makes a film work and what doesn’t – which we did during dinner.

Saturday night was the house the way I love it, Lucy and Charlotte in her room, Taylor back in her nest bed, kids and dogs and activity in every corner. My family!

Her bed really is called a nest bed, that is the style and I love the name since like a bird she really does nest in there.

Sunday was rainy and she was coming down with something which I think was just the first three weeks of no curfew on school nights and the life of a freshman, movies at midnight, clases at eight the next morning. She was just exhausted so nobody left the house all day with the exception of Glenn and I going to the gym. The Yankees and Giants were playing so he never left his nest, the sofa in the kitchen in front of the TV.

Taylor never left her nest except to go see her friend Olivia but otherwise her friends came to see her and joined her in her nest. And I spent much of the day in technology hell as the rain screwed up our internet connections and I had so much to do online. So Lucy who is the only one who memorizes all the passwords had to go from computer to computer with me trying to get them all to work.

It too was a great day, all of us home just doing our own thing and me yelling at Time Warner Cable which has become a daily occurrence of late.

Lucy and I made Coq Au Vin, Ina Garten’s not Julia Child’s, we had French family supper, Taylor’s friend Charles joined us and with Charles always comes lively conversation.

I was really good. For some reason I could listen to the details of her new life, but remain non-judgmental and try not to give advice.

If there were things I might not approve of, I shut my mouth. She was generous to trust me enough to share so much with me, I have to respect she is a young adult and needs to make her own decisions. How often she does her laundry at school has nothing to do with me. How late she stays up has nothing to do with me. Those parts of her life as well as other are hers and hers alone now. I have a different place and I am getting used to it.

I was able to relish her company without thinking about when I would see her again; well, not entirely. But I did not whine when she said she would not be home for the Columbus Day three-day weekend. She brought it up on her own and explained if she came she would then be gone from campus three weekends in a row, she is going to Hopkins next weekend to spend her best friend’s birthday with her. And I totally understood. That would be too much and she has her life there to live.

I only had one moment in the tub when I counted the days until I saw her again. She wants me to come up and take her to dinner, but I realized my book deadline is so immediate once I return from Blakepalooza I won’t have time to do anything but write or go anywhere except parent’s weekend the end of October.

If I write weekends I might be able to slip in a one-day trip the middle of October!

But it all felt fine. She has her things to do and I have mine and I realized she could flop back in to the homestead and it felt like it always did. I’m sure that will change in time, but the moment, I must practice living in the moment, and at the moment when she is there it all feels seamless.

We will see lots of her in November as we have Thanksgiving, and the MIAAC Film Festival where LUCKY DUCKS is premiering.

Taylor will be down for that since she is on the panel and she really wants see the film we made together play at the Quad Theatre. It is too exciting to miss and we will have a big party to celebrate.

Some people have said that when they come home you spend the whole day before focused on they’re leaving the next. I didn’t do that. I imagine it had a lot to do with the fact I left this morning before she did. I had a plane to catch. I’m actually writing this from Virgin America somewhere over Iowa on my way to three days of remembering Blake. It’s usually easier for the one leaving than the one left, but this morning we both left only I left first.

So Freshman Mom learned some lessons and she got her Freshman home too.

Her Freshman I think was happy to be home and went back to school with some cool new stuff.

There will be many more things to adjust to over the next seven months, so we will keep the blog going. But I am learning as much or more than she is.

The lesson being life is school and in many ways we are all Freshman each and every day. So much that comes our way is meant to teach us a lesson – sometimes about who we are, sometimes about who we were and what we have to let go of and sometimes about who we can or cannot be. I learned a lot last week.

Keeping up the grateful book – I am grateful for last week.

And I am very grateful for last weekend.

FRESHMAN MOM

Freshman Mom is taking the week off to blog about Blake Snyder and his memorial events. For those of you interested they will appear on the website under ARTICLES.