Goodbye

Today Tink will leave for college (again), and she will leave while we are away at work. We said our goodbyes at bedtime last night. I kept a "stiff upper lip" and then I went to my room and sobbed.

I don't know why I cried; we have fought most of the summer. We have fought about the mobile pig sty that passes for her car. We have fought about how little time she was spending at home. We have fought about the way some of her friends take advantage of her. We have fought about the condition of her room, the way she spends money, and her desire for a new laptop. Her father (the most wonderful man in the world) and I have suffered her withering looks, the rolling of the eyes, her scornful tone, and her indifference. Why did I cry?

Today she will leave. She will leave behind a room that by all rights should be declared a hazardous area. She will take her bed but not the stuff that was under it. She will take her treasures but not her trash. She will leave the remnants of her childhood scattered about the house. She will leave behind memories of the not-so-distant past when we were "best friends."

Today she will leave. And I will miss her terribly.