Kindergarten Round-up

I have three kids and my youngest, Lauren (or The Babe as I like to call her) is going to kindergarten next year. I went to Kindergarten Round-up at the elementary school and really only half listened to the same spiel I heard for my two older kids when they started kindergarten. I was distracted by the awareness that she's my last one, my Babe. Her going to kindergarten marks the passing of an era in my child-rearing journey. And I find myself faced once more with the all too familiar task of letting go.

I had a conversation with a friend the other day that was ultimately about letting go. I made some remark during our conversation that the past 2 and a half years feels like it has been this long process of learning to let go; letting go of dreams, hopes, realities, hurts, anger, fear, resentment, blame, expectations... the list goes on and on.

The other day, Grace and I were in the car together and she said, "You know what, Mom? I found out that sometimes the things you're afraid of aren't really that scary after all." She was referring to doing a back flip off the monkey bars on the playground, but the truth in that statement resonated with me. Sometimes the thought of letting go is scarier than the act of letting go.

I have found that the act of letting go is an act of faith. A friend once said to me that with every new beginning comes a goodbye to something old. Sometimes, when I'm looking at letting of a dream that has nested in my heart for a while all I can see is the emptiness that it's release will leave behind. It's hard to see that by letting go of that dream that can no longer be I'm also making room for new dreams to take root. And sometimes it's easier for me to hold onto my fears or obstacles so I don't have to face the unknown. Sometimes possibility and promise is hard to face if you don't know what it looks like.

But the hope remains that if I let go of these things that no longer have a home in my heart, I won't be left empty-handed, a hollow shell of who I once was. There will be new growth, new dreams, and healing where wounds once resided.

So off she goes. Off to face the brave new world of full-day school, scissors and glue, letters and numbers, new friends, new teachers, lunch in a lunch box... the whole bit in all its kindergarten splendor. And I'll let her go, albeit begrudgingly at first. And I'll mourn the loss of our easy afternoons spent playing and baking together, the inevitable loss of her baby-ness that I adore, the correction of her mispronunciation of "something" that still comes out "somefing". And I'll mourn the loss of being the center of her ever widening world.

But I'll try to remember all the goodness yet to come. And I'll remind myself that each new stage is a new adventure and that in order to embrace it fully with open arms, I'm going to have to let go of the old... (sigh).

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