Insanity

This college app thing is going to make me a crazy woman. Actually, this WHOLE college thing is going to make me a crazy woman. If I'm not in the loony bin by the time Aidan goes off to wherever, it will be nothing short of a miracle. A big one.

When did colleges come up with the ludicrous idea of having kids write essays to distinguish themselves from other applicants? I mean, seriously -- you have a jillion kids applying to your university. This translates (at least at UT) into two, possibly three jillion essays. Someone has to read them all. So the kid has to write a hugely amazing essay to even get noticed. Out of jillions. And what about the poor souls who have to read all those essays? Don't you think some of them get a little glazed after awhile? Do they just sort-of start throwing essays on random piles -- the "awesome" pile, the "not too bad" pile, the "ho-hum" pile and the "don't even bother" pile must get pretty mixed up after awhile.

And dear Aidan -- he could have avoided all this mess (at least at UT) by being the valedictorian of his class. UT automatically accepts the top 8% of students in any given school. The top 8% at Aidan's school is the top person. There are ten kids in his entire graduating class. He is the salutatorian. Second place. And while we are immensely proud of him for achieving that status, and feel it is just as amazing at a small school as a large one ... this means he must apply to UT and get in on MERIT! Honestly, I can't see where that would be hard, but it's just such a huge hassle.

Then our pastor the other day said he wouldn't send a kid to UT because there were a couple of kids from our church (or at least kids he knew) who had gone to UT and ended up renouncing their faith. Presumably this was because of philosophy classes. That isn't something a parent of a Christian kid who is considering UT wants to hear. I reminded the pastor that this is why we've been having him over on Monday nights to go through deeper materials than they get in youth group to be sure that Aidan KNOWS what he believes, knows WHY, and understands why it makes more sense than anything else. And I believe Aidan does know that. I feel pretty good about him. I also know the Enemy is pretty sneaky and doesn't always do things the way we might expect, so I'm not taking Aidan's strong faith for granted. This kid is getting lots of prayer. And I'm sure there have been plenty of Christian kids who have gone through UT and come out the other end not only unscathed, but even stronger in their faith. (As well as kids who have gone to other schools who have not -- it's not just UT that chews Christians up and spits them out).

Ugh.

And it's only (nearly) September!

Lord, keep on giving me the strength for this! And please let us know exactly where You want Aidan to go, and give him favor to stand out from the other applicants and be accepted!

I'm going to bed.

College app time

Aidan came home from school the other day ready to get started on the application process. He's had all summer to start thinking about this, but it took his English teacher and the school's college counselor to really wake him up to the reality that THIS IS IT, NOW IS THE TIME! Apparently the English teacher's daughter had her app in at UT on September 1 the year she applied, and she not only got into the school, but got the dorm of her choice.

So we now have made a tentative deadline for ourselves of September 15.

Aidan went online to the "Apply Texas" website (it's for all Texas schools, not just UT) and started filling in the app. And I'm freaking out that he'll somehow accidentally do something wrong. Of course, we're going to have the college counselor (Mrs. K) look over everything, so I don't know why I'm worried. He does have to write TWO essays, and there is a third that is optional (we think he should do it as well). His English teacher has assigned the class to write an essay based on one of the questions at the Apply Texas site. It's due Tuesday.

The thing that's freaking Aidan out is the quality of the essays she read to the class yesterday. They were written by former students at his school, and he said they were "intimidating." The Bjorn said "Oooh, yeah, those application essays really have to stand out." I mean, no pressure! I am SO glad things weren't like this when I went to college!

Aidan had only two schools picked out to apply to (UT and U Chicago). We encouraged him to apply to a couple more, just as "backups." So he picked The University of Colorado at Boulder and Rice (in Houston), since they both have undergraduate linguistics programs. Undergrad programs in linguistics are hard to find, since most schools have linguistics as only a grad-school program (you major in a language as an undergrad, then do linguistics as a grad student, which Aidan doesn't want to do since he is most interested in historical linguistics, not a particular language). Anyway, I found myself thinking, "Oooh, Boulder would be cool!" because Aidan was actually born in Boulder and Bjorn did some grad-level study there. And then I thought, "What am I thinking????? That's nowhere near here!!!" I don't know which one of those thoughts was the more rational one. (OKay, I do, I just don't want to admit it! lol)

I also am not the least bit worried about Aidan screwing up the apps for other schools. I figure if he does that, then that's one less far-away school I have to worry about! Aren't I terrible!!!

I have been praying about this, though. I asked God to give Aidan favor at the school he wants Aidan to go to, and if it isn't the one I want, to give me peace.

Aidan and I have been really enjoying the just-us-in-the-car times we've had this week (since he still doesn't have his driver's license, we're still doing the shuttling to and from school). *SIGH*

He is a neat kid. I'm very, very grateful God gave him to us!

First Day of Senior Year

Okay, technically that was yesterday. I wasn't in a blogging mood yesterday, so I didn't write about it.

I didn't write about:
- Getting up at 6:30 to make breakfast, thinking "This is the last year I'll be doing this on a regular basis."

- Making Aidan's ubiquitous peanut-butter sandwich for lunch and thinking "This is the last year I'll be making his lunch on a regular basis."

- Kissing him good-bye at the door and thinking "This is the last year I'll be doing this every morning on a regular basis."

- Wandering around the house after he and Bjorn had driven off for the day, thinking, "Is this what it's going to be like after he goes off to school? This kind-of lonely, empty feeling?" Which, technically, I didn't really have because my heart knew he would be coming home after school and all would be well. The lonely, empty feeling was more "real" when he was off at Latin nationals for a week at the end of July. And then I was busy getting ready for our trip to London and Norway the following week, so I didn't have much time to dwell on the "faux Empty Nest" feeling.

God is trying to show me that Aidan is not my own, that he belongs to God, and that God has amazing and wonderful things planned for him. He's trying to tell me that we did a good job raising this kid and it's time to prepare to let go and let him go out into the world and do whatever it is he's supposed to do. Sometimes I really find peace with that. Sometimes I think, "Okay, God, you know I really, really hope Your will is that Aidan do his undergrad studies here at UT, but if You have something else planned, well, then, I'll accept that."

Until Aidan says something like, "I think God is telling me He wants me to go to the University of Chicago." In which case I want to throttle Aidan and tell him he doesn't have the slightest clue what God is saying to him, and then I proceed to tell God once again that I really, really want Aidan to stay here and go to UT.

*SIGH* God has a long way to take me this year.

Right now, today, the second day of Aidan's senior year, I'm not sure what I'm feeling. I do know that, today anyway, I want to take every day as a gift and not dwell so much on the long view. This morning I started to think, "It is so danged hot! I can't wait for October!" And then I thought, wait, yes I can wait for October. Hot or not, this day is not as close to THAT day as October will be.

Anyway, right now my son, my only child, is sitting in the office with me, looking at the various web comics he keeps up with. It's raining outside. It's cozy in here. And it's what I have RIGHT NOW. I'll take it.

And so it begins

Well, technically it begins on Monday, but my wonderful, funny, gifted, sweet, amazing, talented, exasperating, infuriating, opinionated, too-smart-for-his-own-good son is now in his senior year at high school. He is my only child, and I am dreading this Empty Nest thing with everything in me. I love this kid, yes, but it's more than that. Since he's an only child, he and I have been "buddies" since Day One. Sure, the buddy thing is different now than it was when he was, say, three years old. Now he'd probably "rather be dipped in bubonic plague" than use the word "buddy" to describe his mother. But the truth remains that we are very close, and I have no idea at this point in the journey how I will survive with him not at home every day.

What really stinks is that I am also starting menopause. I believe that this is why women should get married and have their children EARLY in life (say, around age 20) -- I mean, menopause is enough of a Major Life Change without adding in the Major Life Change of having your last/only kid leave home. Assuming you like your kid. So not only do I have mood swings and cry at the drop of a hat for no reason, I also cry at the drop of a hat when I think about Aidan going off and leaving us.

We live in the Central Texas area, so I want him to go to UT, or Baylor, even Rice would be okay. He wants to major in linguistics, so A&M is out. UT would be the best choice, since they have one of the best linguistics programs in the country. So wouldn't you think he'd just choose that (UT) and go with it?

Ah, yes, but "Mom, that's not much of a change, is it, to stay close to home?" What's so bad about close-to-home? Why does he think he needs a Big Change? C'mon, Texas ain't that bad, kid. And neither are we. And we don't have the money to be flying him home to see us every month or so from, say, Chicago or Alberta. I'm not ready to go from seeing him every day to seeing him once or twice a year. That's a little abrupt.

So, yeah, there are going to be some struggles and some stresses this year like there have never been before.

I wish I was one of those parents who just got all excited about their kid going "out into the world," experiencing life, doing new things, meeting new people, seeing new vistas. In a way, I am. I mean, God did not create this kid so he could stick around our house for his entire life. I understand that, I'm cool with that (mostly). I want him to live the life God has for him. It's the "new vistas" thing that has me worried. I'm good with new vistas in a couple of years AFTER we've gotten used to him not living at home anymore. Not so much right now.

So, anyway, as my profile says, I'm a Christian (we all are in this family), and I'm trying hard to do this thing God's way, to not get in God's way, to encourage Aidan to be the man God wants him to be -- wherever that may end up being. So this blog is intended to chronicle my personal journey as we face this huge upheaval. My hope and prayer is that by the time graduation gets here, by the time he really does go "off" to college (whether that be across town or across the country), that God and I will have worked through it and I'll be okay.

Alright, Lord, here we go ...