Empty nests

Earlier this summer, while pruning a hedge, I came upon a small jumble of sticks. The empty nest had sheltered – or so I believe – a family of hummingbirds that had been whizzing past my head for weeks.

Since its usefulness was over, I discarded it.

This week, I’m tackling a different chore: packing sheets and towels, cold medicine and ibuprofen, a stapler and everything else I can think of that my almost-eighteen-year-old son might need as a freshman at the University of Arizona. It’s probably the last time I’ll ever pack for him.

I’m turning over other responsibilities as well. For each of my two sons, I kept a scrapbook through high school graduation, so they and their future families will have a record of his childhood. Whether they choose to continue saving and organizing photos and mementoes is up to them.

In a few weeks, my husband and I will drive our younger son to Tucson. I’ll probably embarrass him by fussing over his dorm room, although I’ll try not to.

My own parents simply put me on a plane for Boston and shipped my trunk. Three years ago, my older son had a different setup when he enrolled at Vanderbilt University: although he flew by himself, his grandmother met him at the airport. His trunk, which I’d stocked during a visit to my mother that summer, was already in Nashville.

After our brief trip to Arizona, my husband and I will drive back to California, to a house that has no more children in it. Sadly, our cat, as I mentioned in a previous blog, has cancer and won’t be with us much longer, either.

We have lots of plans for what to do with our empty-nest time. More evenings out together. More visits with friends. More travel.

The years of raising kids seemed to stretch on forever. Now they seem as ephemeral as the whir of a hummingbird’s wings.