The quick and dirty of taking your daughter to college

We have discovered a new way to count travel time. Instead of hours (10) or miles (650) or states (four) or time zones (2), we count episodes of Providence, the 90s TV drama about the beautiful and altruistic Dr. Syd Hansen, her attractive but quirky family, and all their respective love interests.

The distance between Des Moines, Iowa, and Dayton, Ohio, is about twelve episodes of Providence.

Each episode begins with the Beatle's song "In My Life." The one that starts:

"There are places I remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain."

Thus, we listen to the above lyrics approximately 12 times. As if it isn't sad enough to take your daughter to college.

*

Amanda tears up before getting in the car, way back in our driveway in Des Moines. Actually, she stands in the kitchen immobile. I put my arm around her and walked her outside. Then she stands in the driveway, immobile. The car was all packed when Bob presented her with a special golf ball, representing all the games she didn't want to play with him. Ha, ha, ha. She laughs while she cries. Bob and Aidan each take an arm and walk her to the passenger side of the car. She sits down. "It stinks in here," she says, proceeds to rip out all the lemon auto-deodorizers from the vents that she had previously thought smelled great. She didn't want to inhale anything. She didn't want to talk, to listen to music, or turn on news radio. Just quiet.

We get as far as East Des Moines (about five miles down the interstate), she starts playing the Providence DVDs, which we've been watching together since Amanda was three. Friday nights when it aired, I'd sit sideways on the sofa and she'd cuddle into me. For some reason, that show stuck. I think its the music, the scenery, and the soft depictions of drama and home. And of course, the strong female lead. Recently, we ordered the complete series off the internet from some dude who bootlegged them from Lifetime TV for Women. (The network did not make them available when the series was cancelled in early 2000s.) He did a pretty good high quality recording job. The tapes have brought us enormous comfort. To you, pirating dude, who sold us the entire series of Providence - thank you.

"This is not goodbye," I say as she separates from the house, the yard, her dad, her brother, and this era of our lives. "This is see-you next week." (Because all three of us will be visiting her for opening day next week. This particular trip is for her 10-day cheer camp. Think football camp only harder and with less respect.)

Later she would realize she forgot to say goodbye to the cats but we vow to FaceTime them.

*

As for myself, I am pretty practical. I do all the driving. I manage the itinerary. Two activities for which Amanda is usually voraciously involved. I keep it all moving. And to be clear, in the past two years I did my mother-damndest to read the signals about this whole college search thing. I had not pushed the Ohio idea. She did. It all came from her. A nice little scholarship helped, but I told her in the past we didn't care about the scholarship. She could pick a school in Iowa, in Minnesota, wherever, we'd make it work, I said.

As we approach eastern Indiana, a day of driving behind us, the dusk settled into the sky. The Midwestern highway was cars and headlights, the sun no longer reliable. I feel a brick grow in my stomach, slowly moving up to my throat. I'm starting to wonder if we've made a horrible mistake.

"I'm not hungry," Amanda says. "Let's not eat dinner."

"OK," I say. "I'm not hungry either." I didn't even want a glass of wine.

*

"Please take all our your parents' successes and mistakes as your lessons," is one of my many parting pieces of wisdom I attempt to impart. Mostly, at this point, I'm referring to our financial successes and mistakes.

I won't go into details, but somehow Amanda and I find ourselves landed in Dayton, Ohio, for the night, in a bit of a quandary due to a snafu with credit cards, debit cards, and check books. It's kind of embarrassing so I won't go into the details but I will admit to a symbiotic dysfunction whereby an anonymous mother is so anxious about her daughter flying the coup that she repeatedly gives said daughter the credit card with a green light. Just a little pre-college jitters and/or post-parenting regrets. Indiscriminate buying stuff solves all that, correct?

So, we're in a hotel room we probably can't afford and Amanda is imagining me attempting to return to Des Moines in the dark, stuck in a Walmart parking lot with no gas or money in the middle of the night.

"I'm worried about you," she says.

"I'll be fine," I say. She says she's worried about me driving the 10 hour return trip without money. But I know she's really worried about me being alone. I feel a genuine concern, like all of a sudden she believes this isn't about her, but about me. I appreciate the sentiment, but I want her to be free.

"Really, I'll be," I say. And I mean it.

We sit together on one of the queen sized beds in our hotel room reviewing accounts and paychecks and anticipated scholarships and possible cash sources. The student job fair isn't until next week. Meanwhile, I arrive at a bright idea at about 4 a.m. rise from my sleep to apply for additional credit cards. Plus, it seems like a good reason to get out of bed and start mind wandering. I'm thinking, why are we in Ohio? We can't afford a school four states away. How will she get home if the apocalypse happens? I'm so glad for my social security number, how do people survive without a social? OMG, thank you for my job, an identity, a family, a support network. Thank you so much. How do people survive is they are alone? Amanda and I need to cobble together a financial plan for the next three days (for her) and the return home (for me). It's not like we're poor.

About 4:30 a.m. I go back to sleep.

I wake up with pretty nasty bloodshot eyes. Amanda cheers me up with her version of the camp song "heads, shoulders, knees, and toes" singing it faster and faster with a huge sunny smile. She puts enthusiastic words to the motions but I can't remember them.

*

Bob helps us cobble together a financial plan for the next three days.

It's time to actually move into the on-campus residential hall. (It's move in day only for students attending sports camps.) A half hour drive further east from our former hotel room in Dayton, we are the first in line to get dorm room keys as I'm determined that at least one cheerleader will get in before the football players do. I tell Amanda (again) the reason why food aid needs to be distributed in refugee camps to women and children separately from the men and teen boys (and would-be football players), because if it wasn't, the women and children wouldn't get any. I am prepared to get my Brooklyn on and elbow our way to our rightful place in line.

"Mom, don't say anything weird," Amanda pleads, her eyes rolling at my bravada.

In reality, we are the only ones waiting at the front doors for the precise one o'clock move in time with the exception of one other father of a football player. When I see hall staff approach front door, I eye the dad and use body language to solidify our position as first in line, shifting forward and center. The front doors are unlocked, football dad lets us in first with nary a whiff of challenge. In fact, he seems really nice. It takes Amanda about three minutes to get her key and sign the room contract. The actual move in process is a two hour blur. Goes really fast. Molly, the roommate, and her family, are kind and generous people.

I have no idea what they think of me. My hair is frizzy as I've given up on the straightening iron in the humidity and I'm wearing plain jane workout clothes. I try to be polite, but I am not particularly chatty because all I can think about this my last two hours as I know it with my daughter. But I do have the $100 (cash) to pay for Amanda's half of the fridge and microwave rental, which we all agreed was a rip off. Everything's in. Beds are made. The pink and gray decorating scheme looks good (flowers and polka dots, respectively). The new roommates go together to the athletic building for their first session of cheer camp. All parents depart.

*

Robin Williams dies.
Depression kills.
Addiction sucks.
Gaza perishes.
An unarmed black boy is shot by police in St. Louis.
Innocent children are imprisoned on the U.S./Mexico border.
A helicopter is down.
Syrian refugees flee. Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Honduras.
A zillion people would sacrifice much for the privilege of education.
Etc.

I wail, but not for any of the above reasons. I drive a circle around campus, alone with my car windows rolled up, and I bellow so loud because I don't know what else to do. I'm overcome with grief and not because of death and despair, but because of life and gratitude. Because a new era has begun. Because this little kid who has been the center of my life for almost 18 years has moved on, as she should. Because of all the times I did not want to be a mother. Because of all the times I wished I were somewhere else. Because I got to do it anyway.

I howl at the top of my lungs, hoping it will make me feel better faster. (Notwithstanding, we'll be back next week.)

*

One of the clever things about Providence is that the mother (brilliantly portrayed by Concetta Tomei) comes back from the dead through the nightly dreams of her daughter, Dr. Syd Hansen (the strong female lead). Kooky improbable dreams. She's always wearing the same powdered blue dress and she's always smoking a cigarette. She's as cynical as Syd is idealistic. Through the dreams, Syd is able to work out her mother-issues, even though her mother has died, and her mother is able to provide basic advise for daily issues. It's funny yet poignant yet ridiculous yet truthful. Amanda and I didn't make it through the last episodes of the entire series, but Amanda will surely get through those on her own. She has every single DVD with her in that dorm room.

"Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them
In my life, I love you more
In my life, I love you more."

*

That's the quick and dirty of cheer camp move in day. Thanks for coming over to my blog.

With love from yours truly,

Natural Born Bleeding Heart