If you think about it, life is full of beginnings. With a single cry, life begins fresh and new. We know little more than the sound of our mother’s voice and the warmth of the womb, still we forge ahead tasting, seeing, and experiencing life each moment taking each day as it comes.
School begins. We begin to learn amazing things: how to read, how to write, how to calculate, and how to philosophize and along the way we learn how to make friends. Friendships begin, and then they end. Some friendships last forever if we’re lucky. If not, people drift through our life at an alarming rate fulfilling their purpose in our life touching us in profound ways. Touching us as fate would have it.
Boy meets girl and love is discovered, and sometimes hate, sadness, rejection, and disappointment. Romances begin, and sometimes end. They always begin again until our soul mate waltzes into our lives and knock us for a loop. From each new beginning we learn. Marriage marks a new beginning filled with promise and hope. Couples forge through life together marking new beginnings as home owners and as parents.
The arrival of a baby marks a special beginning. Each beginning is a departure from how life used to be and although scary, each beginning is filled with excitement and anticipation. Sometimes all goes wrong. We survive divorce and forge again with someone new discovering that even after heartache and loss a new beginning is always possible.
We work, we play, we live and each day marks a new beginning filled with promise and hope. Each new day is fresh with no mistakes. A new day is like a fresh new page of our life to be written on. Beginnings bring excitement and fear of the unknown, but somehow we adjust and embrace the beginnings and life continues to flow and we grow. Even death will be a new beginning where we will finally discover what really lies beyond that last breath. Even though I will probably always agonize about new beginnings a little, I have found as I grow older it is becoming a little easier to embrace what will and must come until next time when I give you another glimpse into the life of a trucker’s wife.
The only good thing about endings is that with them come the dawn of new beginnings. A person can almost tolerate the pain of saying goodbye when you fill your mind with the excitement of something new and unknown.
The other day I walked out to get the mail and instead of the usual bills I discovered a letter from my daughter’s school. Toward the end of the year my daughter was tested to see if she would qualify for high ability classes. Throughout all of her years of school she has always achieved straight A’s. When she was in 4th grade she was tested for high ability and it was decided by educators in charge of such things that she remain where she was. At that point she cried because she didn’t get in! It was feared at the time that if she was moved up she might struggle, be overwhelmed, and then her self esteem would suffer.
This past year was an easy year for my daughter. The many times I ventured to the school to have lunch with her I discovered her to be extremely happy surrounded by her circle of friends. When it came time for her to be tested for the high ability classes for next year, her friends encouraged her to fail while I encouraged her to do her best. She wanted to stay where she was and wanted nothing more than to stay where it was safe surrounded by her friends, happy, and sliding through life without a care in the world.
I knew the envelope from the mailbox held the answer to her placement for the new school year and I knew instinctively that I had to open it before I went into the house. I tore it open and scanned through the letter that congratulated me and her for being placed into high ability for the coming school year. I braced myself to tell her. I knew she would not be happy. This letter confirmed that from here on out she would no longer be in an ordinary class with her friends, but moved to another section of the school and surrounded by other brainy kids she had yet to meet who excelled. I no longer was in a rush to get inside. I thought about my funny, zany girl and knew deep down that even being challenged mentally in high ability wouldn’t extinguish the comedic zany spark I always have seen in her. I knew I had to tell her, and I dreaded it.
I had good reason to dread being the bearer of this particular piece of news. At the announcement that she would leave M team to join the high ability S team of her intermediate school my daughter moaned “NO!” like a wounded animal and promptly broke into sobs. My heart broke for her but I knew what I had to do. I hugged her and helped her look on the bright side of this situation. Even though there was the stipulation that I could request she not be moved into high ability classes promising more work and the concept of leaving her group of friends, I presented the concept that perhaps this ending was meant to be.
Perhaps she should have been with the smart kids all along. I could see her fears ran deeper than leaving the friends she had found the year before. The bottom line was that she was afraid she would fail miserably and never be able to keep up. It was time for her to ride the lightning and step up to the plate. It was time for her to be challenged and have her mind opened to more new exciting things.
In another year the end of intermediate school will come and junior high will dawn on the horizon with even more promise for growth and opportunity. Absolutely nothing stays the same. Life is ever changing and keeps on playing out as it is meant to. I swallowed my own personal reservations about this new appointment and chose to encourage her. We chose to celebrate her successes and look forward to the future instead of dwelling on everything she would be leaving behind. With endings come the promise of a new beginning and with that comes excitement and hope for all the tomorrows to come until next time when I give you another glimpse into the life of a trucker’s wife.
Yesterday I watched as my son graduated from kindergarten. I don’t know what I expected when I arrived at the school for kindergarten graduationand took my place in the row of chairs facing my son’s class, but I certainly didn’t expect to be overwhelmed with the urge to cry or the memories that flooded my brain as I watched the events unfold.
I remembered the first moment I laid eyes on my son and how my whole being filled with unconditional love for him. That feeling returned as he waved and a smile lit his face that could turn night to day at my arrival. It was if in that moment he and I were the only ones there in that classroom. The feeling quickly faded as one over zealous parent stumbled past me with a camcorder the size of an elephant’s a$$. There really was no available room on the other side of me for her, but she pushed her way through and made room for herself. Seconds later, I heard her exclaim “Damn it, my battery just died!” I glanced in her direction and tried to remember my manners and force myself not to stare at her predicament. My eyes found my son again, as she almost took out the child sized play kitchen that stood between her and the wall with her monstrosity of a camera. I allowed myself to smirk, but nothing more.
I watched as he and his class performed several songs with so much confidence. The time then came when his teacher began calling each student to come forward and accept their diploma. Instead of racing up to her and snatching his diploma away and running hell bent for election to his seat like he had at the first of the year when he received an award for integrity, I watched my son stand up, walk sedately to his teacher, accept his diploma and then turn towards me with a smile that lit the room and wait for me to take a picture. Just as unexpected were the tears of undulated pride that pricked my eyes. I jumped up and took a picture just as I was expected to do and he returned to his seat beaming from ear to ear. His smile was infectious. I couldn’t help grinning like a blooming idiot as he literally glowed with his achievement.
There have been moments this past year when I wondered if we would ever make it to this day. I remembered the surgery he underwent last fall, and his accident leading to a severe concussion this spring. I remembered the amazement I felt when he was moved into a first grade math class and his ability to not only do the work given him correctly but with relative ease. I also remember when he finally decided to share with me that yes, he did know how to read! I remembered the pride and amazement I felt when we went to the all school art show and seen for the first time the artwork he had created. I felt the pride rush back from just the day before when he had brought that same art home along with a certificate and blue ribbon for his participation.
I realized as I watched the proceedings, gone forever was that sweet, precious baby I held in my arms and in his place was a little boy ready to proceed on to first grade and life with confidence and determination. I could see how he had changed, and realized how much he had grown over the course of the school year and I realized this was only the beginning until next time when I give you another glimpse into the life of a trucker’s wife.
