This week in between classes, I had a conference call. It lasted about 45 minutes. It was very informative, filled with laughs, reminders, and one I simply could not miss.
This conference call was with my mom and sister. That's right. It wasn't for work, class, anything like that. It was with my family.
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It's so funny to me that this is my life now. I'm the baby of the family and away at college, my sister is halfway across the country, and our mom is back in our hometown. So this is what we have to do since we rarely get to talk to each other all at the same time anymore.
When we were on the phone, you have my sister and me, talking over each other as usual, trying to tell everyone the things going on in our lives, when my mom said something that stuck with me. "This makes me so happy, it's been a while since I've gotten to hear your voices both at the same time."
That sounded so weird to me. Even though my sister has been out of the house for about 10 years now, and I've been off at college for two, I never really sat down and thought about this new normal that is our lives.
My parents are empty nesters. Their babies are adults. (Okay, well me, I'm working on it...)
All of this had me thinking about growing up and how desperately we are to do so.
I can't even tell you how many times I dreamed about being a teenager, then it was graduating high school, then it was college, and so on. And now here we are.
I'm a junior in college, on the edge of real life adulthood, wishing for one more family game night, dinner together, movie date, anything.
I find myself wishing that my big sister could pick me up from second grade one more time and drag me to soccer practice with her while I sat on the bleachers doing my multiplication facts until she was done so we could go home to our mom.
Or that I could come home to my mom and dad after a long day at school, instead of an empty apartment and microwaved meals.
Now I was always that girl who counted the days down to high school graduation, I couldn't wait to get out, leave my hometown behind and start a new adventure. Don't get me wrong, I love college, it's been the hardest but most fun thing I've yet to do. But sometimes you just miss the way things used to be. We miss the simplicity, the slowness of it all. Reality really sets in when you realize things will never be that way again, but then I realize as sad as it may be for us, our parents have been thinking this all along.
Every milestone, every year passed, they were praying for us to slow down. While we were wishing high school away, they were hanging on to every day.
Then it happens, slowly but all at once. We leave, we move on. We are now in this new stage in our lives, we have a new normal to adapt to.
We grew up. We are growing up, still. It happens when you stop wishing for it, and then it happens so fast you don't realize it. It's every bit of terrifying as it is amazing. Just remember to stop wishing the days away, because once you get to where you think you want to be, there's no going back.
Oh! And conference call your parents, your siblings, your grandparents. Have a giant family reunion over the phone if you want. It'll do your heart some good and it'll remind you that even though you've changed and grown up, your family is still as crazy as they'll always be.
