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The summer is winding down and in the Williams household, just like in homes across the country, we are gearing up to get back to school.
The adventurous summer the boys had — New York, Kenya, Miami, Atlanta — already has been stored in memory for them to draw from in later years when they talk about that one summer that most impacted their life with their buddies or share it with their kids over the dinner table some day.
One of the things I love about kids is that they are constantly changing, growing and that means that just as one adventure ends, another begins. There always seems to be something going on.Take this passed weekend, my oldest and I shared a small but powerful moment. Trey (the oldest) is finally home from his summer travels and immediately is into back-to-college mode. He’s 20 and a junior at North West Missouri State.This will be the first school year he lives off campus in an apartment rather than in the dormitory. He’ll be living with two young ladies in a three-bedroom apartment. He’s very excited about making the place comfortable and having it look mature.
A few weeks ago, he’d left instructions for me to help him find just the right antique dresser for his room. So while he was away I searched thrift and antique stores and finally found what I thought he wanted. The day he got back we went to pick it up. I paid.
I also had new brakes, a wheel alignment and exhaust system put on his car, while he was away; I paid.
Sunday he and I, with this new (really cool looking) piece of antique furniture in the back of his Kia Sportage drove to Maryville to see his new place and do some decorating.A friend of his met us to help carry the dress up the stairs and into his room. The place is really nice, spacious with lovely hard-wood floors. Each of the girls had their room done up nice — home bedroom, not dorm room style.Trey had bought a new wood-framed futon with beige, brush corduroy cushion. We added the dresser and flat-screen television. Then went to Walmart for the rest of the furniture I thought he needed — window treatments (curtains), decorative pillows, a large area rug, a desk and some of those decorative scented oils with the reeds sticking out of them; I paid.
But we had a lot of fun together picking out all this stuff. He went with a brown, beige and red color scheme; very nice. Oh yeah, we bought food too; had to fill the cupboards, the freezer, and the fridge. I paid.He’s got lots of pictures and framed artwork to put on the walls too.We spent about four hours there then headed back home. He drove, a little faster than I would have liked, as a mixture of old-school R&B, early Will Smith and LLCool J-type rap, hip hop and contemporary musical-type songs blared through the car speakers. We sang some, laughed some, snapped our fingers and chatted. It was a marvelous hour and a half moment of mother and son bonding. I couldn’t help thinking too about his dad. I told Trey that it is on the most beautiful days, days like this one – clear blue sky, warm air and fun with a son — that I miss his dad most. I miss that he’s missing out on their growth and how super they are and it makes me so deeply sad.“I miss him all the time,” Trey replied. I realized at that moment that I had actually been an inch from tears the entire day. I stayed there too. No, I didn’t cry. Instead he and I sat quiet taking in that last exchange for a minute. Then another great song came on. We both knew the words, so we sang at the top of our lungs. I think I was singing louder than he because at one point he gave me a little look, his eyes said pipe it down mom. It was fun. Today, he heads back to college, and back to his new apartment, that I helped him decorate. I like to think he’ll always remember too that he and I had that moment together and that it will be a part of his best summer ever tales some day. But even if he doesn’t, I know I’ll never forget it.
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