A letter to my children on the eve of my 35th birthday

[mudblood428]

Dear Harrison and Colin,

While I was working today, I watched "Deep Impact" on Netflix. It's not what one would call a good movie, per se; movies in which all mankind is threatened by a fast moving space rock on a collision course with Earth tend to be categorically terrible due to overly earnest dialogue, bad science, and repetitive deus ex

Comments

[aggiebell90]

Okay, first... Happy birthday

[mudblood428]

Thank you so much for sharing your experiences with me - what an amazing thing to find yourself witnessing these important transitions your children are all making simultaneously! I was talking to my father in law about this yesterday, and it's really interesting to compare all three of our perspectives since I'm still at the beginning of this realization, you are in the thick of living through it, and my father in law is completely on the other side of it. In so many ways, it really is the end of "the world" to let your kids go, but once it happens, a new world begins in which we all have to figure out life after "the event". For my father in law, it was when his son moved out and suddenly he was in an empty house. There was no gradual change; the comet had struck, leaving an alien world in its wake overnight. But while there was a kind of grieving that took place for him, it also enabled him to rebuild a new life and identity for himself - one in which his son was no longer dependent, but still equally loved