I am Breaking

    School is out and I am dealing with a range of emotions. This is the last real "summer" I get to spend with all of my kids. The spectrum of ages that now live in my house is daunting. There is no way to have a family lesson or a family discussion. Things are fragmented. My oldest two are practically adults. Samuel is 13. Jonas and Tika Rae are so young. The movies that I watch with the older ones are nothing like the movies I watch with the younger. My heart is in three separate pieces. Sometimes I wonder if those pieces even touch.  Lilli is embarking on her senior year. She is beginning her life. This is the last summer that I will have a baby in the house: Tika goes to Kindergarten in the fall. I have no idea how to feel. There is joy and sorrow mixed so well together that the emotions negate each other and I am left with a hole. A bright empty  hole.
    The biggest lesson to be learned this summer  though is about the middle child. The strong and adventurous boy who desperately needs freedom and through freedom finds identity. There are so many fights and so many late night conversations. There are so many tears and so many rules. I have looked at him and in plain speech said, "I have never had to raise a child before you. Those other two have never crossed me. They have never asked for their freedom. They have never dated, snuck out of the house, or needed space. If you need to be angry please go yell at them!" I am struggling. By the third child the parent is supposed to be so broken that she just hands the kid the car keys and says, "Just be home before daylight. Alive." I am not raising the third child. I am essentially raising my first. He is a deal breaker and a loner. He is a straight A student with tons of friends. He is 13.
    The dynamics in this house are changing. As I am giving him his freedom I am waiting for Lilli to take hers. I am preparing him to choose a high school. I am also preparing Tika to go boldly and bravely into a class of new friends, new ideas, and new rules. I am trying to figure out if Michael will ever get behind the wheel of a car or will he move to a city with a subway. I am breaking. I am fractured. I have never been so whole knowing that all the things that are happening are supposed to happen and all things are right. 
     I am trying to hand over the little kids to the bigger kids for a few minutes each day this summer. Michael is helping Jonas with math. Sam is helping Tika with money. All that seemed fine until I caught Sam trying to teach Tika to count to 'nerfteen'. (sigh). Lilli has taken on a part time job working for a friend for a few hours a week and I am tempted to ask Sam to teach her about money too.
    There is no joy in me. I am simply counting each hour. The nights are so very long as I ponder, in the heat, if any of these people will be recognizable this time next year. How will a year change them all? How will a year change me. What is like to NOT have a baby in the house? What is it like to watch your first baby turn 18? Life is a gaping hollow hole of perfect. I am miserable. I am so very proud.