This little boy graduated from preschool.  He’ll start kindergarten this school year.  It’s too fast.  He was 2 when you left and now he’s 5, graduating from preschool and on to the next thing.  I do everything without you.  I keep going and going.  

I’m everything to all the boys and not enough for any of them.  The end of the school year is hard.  It’s the significance of one year ending and a new summer beginning.  It means a new school year and everyone moves up to the next grade and we start again, without you.  

We keep starting again and again.  The ending that begins a new phase.  I’m sentimental about the thought that every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end… like it says in the song.  It’s so true…  I know that this ending is the beginning of another new beginning for us.   

What will this year bring?  How will we learn and grow and become better or different? I think back on this past year; it was the first time that it became quiet in my home. The renovations are done.  I’m working less, focusing on myself and the boys more. 

We finally established a family and what it really looks like without dad.   We had our challenges; talks with the principal, late to this and that, forgot about it, missed it and totally failed.  

We made progress; were on time, made the best decision, rested, played and learned something new.  We skipped school, made it there and did our best, slept in and got up early.  We showed up and still missed it.  We helped with assignments and totally dropped the ball.  

We did all these things and it’s all ok, cause I did my best.  I didn’t do it all when I missed something and there were a lot of somethings that I missed.  This year, I focused on letting all the missed things be missed and moving on. 

I didn’t let my brain cells get wasted too much on what I didn’t do, but used them instead to love myself and my boys and stop waiting for things that just aren’t there.   It felt freeing and sad; to accept what is, in all ways and move into loving what is, just as it is.  

So it might be a graduation, an ending and a new beginning and I feel happy for the time we’ve had. I have a knowing that any moment could be the last. We are moving on as if there is everything before us in the form of an amazing future ahead. Grant always said prepare for the worst and plan for the best.  He liked to prep that way.  It worked for him. 

I’m starting to see that planning for the best works better for me cause preparing for the worst seems to make the worst happen. Planning for the best but allowing for anything and accepting it, well that brings a peace that I haven’t known until now. 

I’m really grateful for it.  So here’s to the graduation of the little one, the end of the baby stage… and to the beginning of a new summer. Here’s to what it will bring to us.  Here’s to all things to come.   Bring it on, I’m ready.