Shooting blindfolded with one hand tied behind my back...

Parenting is like shooting in the dark, (actually, that’s how most of us became parents in the first place), you don’t know what you’re aiming at and you’re never quite sure if you’ve hit anything properly. (again, a lot like sex)

Sometimes though the light comes on and you see that the target intended was a direct hit.

Other times the light comes on and you wonder, “Who the bloody hell are you and what are you doing in my bed!”
The boy wonder is 16 going on 40. It is safe to say that he is one thing in my life that I absolutely set out after.

Planned does not begin to describe his conception.

My youngest sister was coming home from boot camp and I told my mother I’d be there if a bedroom were guaranteed as I would be ovulating that weekend and tell the neighbors to pay no mind to the rocking doublewide.

Two worthy events happened that weekend.



The boy wonder was conceived and my sister was informed that she had not discovered a new fantastic rock group.

It was 1988 and Areosmith was making their comeback and I referred her to evidence in the form of a, “Toys in the Attic” album.

Yes, an actual album.

They say marriage is a leap of faith but I think the real leap comes when you parent a child.

Notice I did not say become a parent or give birth.

You’re not a parent unless you do the actual work.

If that confuses you, you haven’t earned the title.

The rest of you need no explanation and that’s the audience I’m writing for today.
My tools for parenting were limited. Basically, I had childhood references of what NOT to do.

I have treated my son as a person since the day he came into this world.

Nothing was left unsaid or unexplained because he was just a child.

There was this one time when he was 2 that I locked myself in the bathroom and called my mother and was sobbing my frustration down the phone.

She told me I was taking this parenting thing much too seriously.

Of course I was.

It was/is my job.
When life was forever altered for he and I when he was ten years old, I made him a promise.

That I would keep him here in his house, his neighborhood, his school until he graduated from high school.

Life as he knew it had exploded and he needed something to remain the same, something he could count on.

I have kept that promise.

The Hubster moved here from London to help me keep that promise.

When there wasn’t any proper work here in New England in the Hubster’s field, he built staging and pushed boxes.

Making an insulting wage that barely kept the bills paid.

It’s why the Hubster has been living and working 6 days a week for the last 20 months in NY and the boy wonder and I live in NH.

It’s difficult sometimes but it’s proper work and wages in Hubster’s field and we no longer struggle to pay the bills.

The plan has been to relocate to NY, (I refuse to move to LA), after the boy wonder graduates and goes off to college.

Until 2 months ago.

The boy wonder and I were driving home late one Sunday night after going to NY to visit the Hubster.

We are chatting and all of a sudden he comes out with:

“I’ll have enough credits except for one English class at the end of this year. If I can take a night class for that and graduate early we can all move to NY.”

“Sell the house?”

“Yes. I can find a place to intern at for what would’ve been my senior year, earn some money and experience and then find a tech school that I can commute to from there.”

He had decided just before high school that he wanted to go to tech school for auto mechanics – gas & diesel and custom auto body.

Being he didn’t grow up in that sort of an environment he feels very behind the other kids he’s taken classes with who’ve had their heads under the hood of a car since they were 10.

The show Hubster has been working on has built up a network of opportunities that the boy wonder has and can continue to benefit from and he knows that.

He also knows how difficult the long distance relationship can be for the Hubster and me. Especially when there are months I see him maybe 2 days out of 30.

I was shocked.

I let it lie for a week and asked him about it.

“Oh yeah, it’s what I want to do.”

Bulls-eye!

I told the Hubster that day over the phone and we both cried.

The light shines bright and true and we’ve come full circle.

That’s why we are making ourselves crazy doing over the kitchen and next the bath to get the house ready to sell come the spring.

And we’ve been looking at land to build a house on with enough acreage for horses for me and motor toys for the boys.

That pic I posted was of 14 acres in the New Paltz area—close enough to 87 for a clear shot down to Manhattan for the Hubster-----and all orchard land.

The process is a difficult one as we plan to own this new family compound for many, many years and we want to get it just right.

Thanks for taking the time to post your thoughts on the photo and excuse the fuzziness of these. The bloody printer refused to scan and I took pics of the pics with the digi-cam.

Oy.