She was already there when I arrived, and from the moment I saw her I knew something was a little different. Whenever Lauren visited us at the shop after she left (she left a few weeks before I did) she always breezed about the place with the comfort of someone who still worked there. But now, she was sitting at a table alone, waiting for me and waiting for Shane to finish a few late lunch customers at the counter. She seemed reserved, even in the greeting we shared and the small talk we made while waiting for our food.
I took a guess and asked her if she was worried about going off to school. She smiled a little nervously and admitted she was more than slightly concerned about it. Lauren never has been someone who could lie about her emotions, whether they were anger, or fear, or hurt. They all play out too easily across her face.
To describe Lauren is easy; she is a good girl. She has always been studious at school and a good athlete. She loves and always speaks well of her family, and she seems to strike a good balance between her family, friends, and school. When we worked together, she never missed a shift, and she always worked hard, with a sense of responsibility you don't often see in teens. Blonde haired, blue eyed, and statuesque, Lauren is beautiful beyond what she recognizes in herself, and her humility about that only adds to her charm and aura of naïveté.
Shane joined us as we settled in over our food, and we began to talk about her going off to college. We tried to make light of some of the things she was about to experience, but it was easy to hear her biggest fears in some of the things she said:
"It's a big campus. I could get lost easily."
"I won't know anyone there. All of my friends are going to other schools."
She went on to say that after lunch with us she was going to her best friend's house to see her and say goodbye. Tonight she was going out to one last movie with her close circle of friends from school and say goodbye to them.
"You are emotionally moving today, where tomorrow you physically move," I told her. I also shared with her that I thought tomorrow was going to be a little bit of a rollercoaster, with much of the day being a high of moving into her dorm, followed by the emotional moment of when her parents drive away and she is suddenly by herself. She said her mom promised not to cry until she was in the car, but didn't mention that maybe she was making that same promise to her mother and herself as well. I hoped to myself that maybe talking about it now, preparing for it, would possibly make it a little easier for her tomorrow.
In Lauren's voiced concerns I recognized one of those times in life where our established confidence recedes and gets replaced by humility. It usually happens when we are moving from one environment to the next, entering a new phase in our life, our growth, our development. I am not sure it is just fear; I sometimes wonder if it isn't something inside us telling us that we need to emotionally wipe the slate clean and look forward to, be open to, whatever it is that is new which is about to be written for us, or by us.
I have often thought that life is a series of environs that we shakily enter, then slowly adjust to, and then finally master. Some last longer than others, and some we only adjust to and decide to linger within. But that initial entrance is somewhat magical, a time in our lives where curiosity and uncertainty blend together to create both focus and openness. It happens with school, work, relationships, moving—all of our major life changes. It isn't until we look back on them that we see how important and exciting those times were for us that we possibly understand their significance.
I was both happy for Lauren and proud of her. She was going through the process of experiencing all that, in her going off to school. It surfaced, for me, my memories of those same kinds of life changes I've been through, and reminded me of how much I've loved them afterward.
I wanted to tell her what I thought she might feel about it after she had been through it all, and gotten more comfortable with her new surroundings, her new friends, and her new routines. But, then I thought better of it. For an eighteen year old, that is something best recognized in the afterglow of your own personal experience, rather than having it spelled out for you by someone older. It wouldn't have meant nearly as much to her to have heard about it now, from me, as it will to see and feel it for herself later.
Lauren has so much ahead of her, and it's easy to imagine a wonderful life for her going forward from this, her new beginning. It will likely involve schedules, and friends, and interests, and deadlines, and responsibilities that won't allow much time for stopping in to see either Shane or me in the future. I realized that today as we said goodbye outside Shane's shop and got in our cars. I don't mind admitting that it made saying goodbye a little difficult.
But it's all okay. I've played my small part in her growing up. It's time to let her grow on her own now. And I expect, as always, she will do it very well.
© 2010 Cody Kilgore. All Rights Reserved worldwide under the Berne Convention. May not be copied or distributed without prior written permission.
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