In just a few months, my eighteen year old son, Rohan, will graduate high school and be off to college. I am having the darnedest time letting go. I have told him in no uncertain terms, that once he leaves, a lot of alcohol and tears will be involved in the healing process.
I recognize that my little boy, is no longer that little. Mature? Now that’s a different ball game. I don’t think men really start maturing till they turn 30, or when they become a father. Some of us may mature as we get older, but we never really grow up.
The thought of being an ’empty nester’ is filled with trepidation. Maybe my insecurity stems from the 13 odd years I spent away from my family, in a British boarding school in India. Maybe it’s just part of my DNA. Maybe I am just a ‘worrier’, in every sense of the word.
Either way, I must learn to let go. I don’t have much of a choice,and the rites of passage have a tendency to dominate. “Letting go may not be easy, but it is certainly necessary”.
About Hemant Rustogi