obsproject.com
What's it like to be 23 and starting a brand-new life? I'm unloading a great deal of feelings as my boy heads to the US
zhihu.com
Can he truly be that old? Was I ever that young? A journey to clear out his student flat has revived many memories
There's a precise, if snide, thing I have actually seen online that reads "No parent on Facebook can think their child has actually turned any age", and yes, OK, not the "on Facebook" bit, however there is a rote awe at time passing that I often slip into, considering my adult children. But, enable me, simply this once, a Facebook parent moment. My older boy turned 23 last month and we have actually simply been to London to collect his stuff at the end of his degree. On the way, I realised I was 23 when I moved there myself.
You can't typically pre-emptively pinpoint parenting "lasts", however when you can, they're unusual and melancholy - even when they're not, objectively, things an individual would pick to do again. This trip included (I hope) my last time standing, hips shrieking from the drive, texting "We're outdoors" as we waited for our kid to get up (my partner ended up tossing a ball at his bedroom window). It was certainly my last time removing my shoes in the middle of the overflowing bins of that sticky-floored trainee house, and hovering over the Trainspotting-esque toilet then choosing versus drying my hands on any of the towels. It ended with the last trip along the M1 crushed in between a salvaged chair, a duvet and an Ikea bag of pans threatening to decapitate me if we made an emergency stop. We were bringing his stuff "home" knowing that it will not be home for him in the exact same method again: he's moving to New york city this summer. Maybe not for ever, however for years, not months.
To intensify the Big Feelings, and the sense of the dizzying slippage of time, my other half and I utilized the journey to wander round Fitzrovia, where we shared our first flat back when I was 23. It's various however not unrecognisable: the healthcare facility has actually been demolished however Tesco is growing
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What's it like to be 23 and Starting a Brand new Life?
antwancoldham4 edited this page 5 months ago