Nine Going on Nineteen

I’m not done with Francis Chan yet, but I digress for a bit with a more indulgent post. (Yeah, like all blogging’s not indulgent.)

This weekend, I took my son my to college. He was invited to a gifted-and-talented program at the university here in town, where he’ll spend the next six Saturday mornings learning about archeology, ancient Egypt, mummies, and the preservation of artifacts. Not exactly how I’d want to spend a Saturday, but he does school really well and has a new-found, Indiana Jones-inspired passion for archeology, so he couldn’t be happier. A few of my observations from our time on campus:

1. As much as I’ve always hoped my kids would go away to college, now that it’s not that far off, I’m thinking a university 10 minutes from our house is not such a bad thing.

2. Going to college in Southern California was one of my smarter moves. As I walked through the bitter cold and blowing snow to Braden’s building, I tried to remember if I ever wore a coat on either of my college campuses. Probably, but my college memories are mostly of shorts, flip-flops, and catnaps in the warm sunshine. In January.

3. God cares about our little personal interests. We found out about this class late in the game, and by the time I called to sign Braden up, the class and the waitlist were both full. I asked to be kept on the list anyway, and a week later, Braden somehow made it in. This is the boy who has checked out 20 books on ancient Egypt in the past month. Who offers classes to his sisters on how to make hieroglyphics. Who taught me what a Canopic jar was. (I could've lived without knowing that.) And God opened up a spot in this particular class just for him. How personal is that?

4. I’ve always prayed that at a young age, my kids would find out what they love and what they’re good at. Granted, Braden’s gone through phases where he loved Pooh Bear, Blue’s Clues, Spiderman, Star Wars, and bullwhips—and grew out of all but the last one. Who knows how long this archaeology thing will last? But today when I told him about my prayer, he said, “Well I really love this.” I am buoyed by the fact that he loves anything at this point beyond video games and antagonizing his sisters. 

5. And finally, the obvious. I am old. I have become one of those old people who says (insert whiny voice), “I just can’t believe how fast the time is going.” This was never the case when I was young. I thought I’d be 14 for the rest of my life and was decidedly unhappy at that prospect. But now that I’ve got kids of my own, I understand what all those gray-haired people have been talking about. One day you’re tying their shoes, and the next you’re paying for an SAT course and applying for financial aid. It’s all going so fast. I love every bit of it, but it really is just too fast.