A House for Two

I cried buckets when Philip left for college. Our tight family of six was breaking up; the life we all had together was crumbling. When Anna and Peter left, I consoled myself that I still had a child at home, and for six more years I had Julia at home to teach. And on Friday, she left. When the last child leaves, it's a very different feeling.
I missed her immediately when I got home from the college trip. I walked into the little back room and saw a plate she'd left there with dribbles of pancake syrup. A fork. A glass. For the last time I picked up her dirty dishes and took them to the sink. And it was bittersweet. I don't care if she was a bit high-maintenance, a bit dramatic, a bit messy. I miss her not just in spite of those things. I miss those things too.
But the empty nest is its own delight! Today I hugged Adam and wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. "We made it! We did it!" I said, enthusiastically. "I feel like we ran the world's longest 3-legged race, and we got to the finish line!" I'm sure those of you with children in their 30s or 40s are giggling at me. But this is a milestone for me. We raised four children who have gone out into the world. I feel relief.
The next morning I started changing things in the house as I want them to be. I took over the back room. It is no longer Julia's hidey-hole and junk dump, haha!

 I turned this back into a real desk, removing the cabinet I'd had sitting on it that blocked the window. Then I cleaned that grimy window, striped with green algae. Now I can sit at my desk and view the barn, the chickens, my hard-working husband. All in the comfort of my own room.

 This room has all my yarn and my soap-making supplies. Plus it's where I'll be writing -- and hopefully writing more productively than before. (I'm in chapter 16 of Ten Days at Federal Hill, the working title of my new children's book.)
I keep all my books in this room too. In the Great Shuffle happening now, I put a few of my very favorites in a rack on the dresser.

That's (l-r) Boswell, Shadow of the Winter Palace, some Medieval and Old English books,
 then Well-Trained Mind, Beowulf, and Blake's selected writings.

 That window-blocking cabinet went in the dining room, atop the old TV cabinet. It looks funny here, but I like it. It holds a lot of tea cups!

 After many years, I've removed the tablecloth and plastic pad from the table, and set it for just Adam and me. Of course, I could've done that a year or so ago. Julia was not a destroyer of furniture. But there's something about having the house to ourselves that makes me want to move things and clean things.

I'm already planning for the children's visit at Thanksgiving. This fall we will work hard on the other building. Adam will finish the electrical work, I'll paint the floor. We will clean and de-bug it and make it cozy for someone to stay there. The futon will go there too.
 I sit here at my desk, gazing out my squeaky-clean window; it looks like autumn. The fig tree's leaves are edged in brown and curling. The light is soft.
I know children are back in school, and I am not there. That's a good thing. Near my desk I have taped my favorite poem, penned by Julia during some homeschool year when we did literature and art together.

 My years teaching her in 7th - 10th grades are my most cherished teaching years of all. It was a delight to open my love for some of those subjects to a child so receptive and bright. May her college years open her mind and heart to yet more wonders.