Lasts

Just when I think I'm doing well in the "new normal" all of us are adjusting to I run across something that triggers me and the flood gates open.  Last night I stumbled across author, Karen Kingsbury, reading her children's book, "Let Me Hold You Longer."  Through her tears she read the entire book out loud to the young adults of the class of 2020.  Friends, I lost it.  Her book is about how a mom experiences the "lasts" of her child that is growing up.  There were a few lasts with Jay and I had no idea they would be his lasts.  The last time he walked off the football field his freshman year, the last time he walked off the basketball court his junior year and the last day he walked out of high school. Most people know the last day they walk out of high school.  They have celebrated all spring with a senior trip, senior skip day, finals and of course their graduation ceremony.  They take pictures of themselves in their caps and gowns on graduation day, most in bear hugs with their friends.  This is simply not to be for the class of 2020.  Our students had no idea that when they walked out of their high school on March 13 that it would be for the last time.  As my friend, Laura, has said sometimes ignorance really is bliss!
As we navigate the new reality we live in there are so many changes and Jay is trying to decide where he goes from here.  It appears that colleges will continue with on-line learning in the fall.  Jay has expressed concern with that and I agree with him.  For a college freshman with dyslexia to start college on-line is tricky, to put it mildly.  So we wait.  We wait for a Jay to get his full time landscaping job back (fingers crossed).  We wait for our local colleges to make a decision about fall on-line learning so that we can in turn make our own informed decision as to what is best for Jay.  We wait to see if Jay gets accepted into the pipefitters apprenticeship.  I could not have predicted this is where we would be on April 29, 2020 but as is often the case the Lord is patient with me and teaches me oh so many lessons.  My plans are not my own and as I told Mike the other day we've taken Jay about as far as we can take him.  The rest is up to Jay and God.  I rest peacefully and confidently in knowing that.