My son and I got into the car one recent morning to head to school. As usual, he got out his ear buds case and began putting them in his ears.
“When you put your ear buds in, it makes me think you don’t want to talk to me. Or maybe it’s just that you don’t want to listen to me,” I said with a smile.
He laughed and put them away.
It didn’t used to take so much work and prompting to talk with my children. When they were young, all they did in the car was talk. In fact, I think sitting in the back of the car created an ideal place for them to talk to me. We weren’t looking at each other in the eye. We were captive audiences to each other.
In those days, they’d ask whatever question came to their mind:
How does a car engine work?
Why do the birds sit on the powerline like that?
How does the music come through the radio?
There was also a running commentary about whatever they saw out their window:
Mom, look at the shape of that cloud!
Why is that car going so fast?
Can we stop at the smoothie place? Please?
Then there would be emergency interjections like:
I have to go potty right now!!
Or I’m hungry, when will we get home?
One time, we were returning home from an appointment and my son complained that it was taking FOREVER to get home. We reached a traffic light and I said, “Let’s see how long forever is. I’ll time it from here. How about you take a guess as to how long you think it will be.”
In case you were wondering, forever is exactly 7 minutes and 42 seconds.
I thought of all these things as I sat in the car beside my son on the way to school. It wasn’t long ago that he sat in an infant carrier behind me, his face looking at the rear of the car. In order to see his face I put a mirror on the seat behind him so I could see him in my rear view mirror. Now he sits taller than I. Later this year, he’ll get his learner’s permit and the year after, his license. And then the season of driving children will be over for me.
If there’s one thing that is true about parenthood is how it’s always changing. Just when I get used to one stage, a new one appears. Lately, I’ve started to feel that way about the teen years. They’ve become like my favorite pair of jeans, soft and worn and comfortable. I know what to expect from my kids and they know what to expect from me. We’ve worked through the stiffness and kinks of those early adolescent years. But my oldest leaves for college later this summer and with that comes a new season of parenting a young adult. Before long, his brother will follow.
After my son put his ear buds away, we chatted all the way to school about the latest news in the world, his friends, and what he is learning in school.
I then tucked those moments away with all my other memories of motherhood, realizing just how quickly the present becomes the past.
Photo by Robin Edqvist on Unsplash
