A Mother's Job

I am getting ready to let go, yet again. Angel Daughter Number One graduated from college in May, adding a numerous number of feathers to her wings. We were lucky enough to have her home for the summer, but now, leases have been signed, boxes are being packed and days are being counted.(For more freedom by her. For less available hugs and kisses for me.)

This time is different. I am not setting forth into the world, a child. I am opening the door and waving good-bye to a woman. A beautiful young woman who must begin her own life, independent of me. Not that I am going anywhere. For as long as I live, I will always be home to four lovely souls.
But for now, I will allow myself to get lost in this face. In these eyes. I will focus on these lips when she speaks to me. Because she is the one who made me into a mother. And although the changes become much more subtle throughout the adult years, I will memorize her face as I did when she was a newborn into a baby into a toddler into a child into a teenager... Because there are certain subtleties that only a mother's mind can record, which cannot be captured anyplace else.

Fly, Angel, fly...It's time to defy gravity.