I've been writing in this space for what seems like forever.
Why? Many reasons. To let others know how Jude's pregnancy with JP was going. To preserve a record for my boys of how I much I loved them when they were growing up and how much they enriched my life in ways small and large. To give my mom something to look forward to as her health began to fade. To try to work out my thoughts and feelings as I watched my mom drift away, stolen by Alzheimer's, and finally, leave me to fend for myself on this earth. To help me, years from now, remember what it was like to be a father of young and growing boys.
Most of all, I think, The Stork Stops Here is a love letter to JP and Joe.
My sons are my world. They are why I get up in the morning and go to work and why I stay late. I can deal with the stress of my job because I am doing it to provide them with the life they have. I work late sometimes, and miss things, to continue to build and maintain a successful career so I can be the provider I need to be. I run, in many ways, for them. I want to try to maintain my health and youth for them, because I became a father relatively late in life.
Now, though, I find myself in the earlier stages of imagining a life without JP and Joe in it every day. How will I be able to do that when the time comes?
How will I be able to say goodbye and watch them go out in the world to live their own lives? I don't know if I can do it.
Later this week, six days from now, JP will turn 16 and get his driver's license. How can the boy I strolled around 12South and Belmont in the Baby Jogger City Elite be on the cusp of driving himself all over Nashville? How?
Just yesterday, or so it seems, I was strolling him down 10th Avenue - on what might have been our very first walk in the old neighborhood together - when neighborhood handyman Ronnie Henderson drove by, saw me, and waved. Later, laughing, he told me I was beaming with the pride of being a first time father as JP and I strolled down the street. He was right.
JP's ready to drive. That's for sure. He's long since logged in the required hours driving with a learner's permit, mostly by driving with Jude. He's taken the dull but necessary eight week long defensive driver's class and driven with an instructor. Think driver's education classes in the old days. A few weeks ago, he took and passed the driver's test. All that awaits is for him to pick up his Tennessee driver's license on Thursday.
The problem, of course, is that I'm not sure I'm ready for him to drive.
A large part of my fear is that I can recall all of the stupid things I did as a young driver. Speeding. Driving recklessly at times. Listening to all kinds of music, loudly, on the Jensen triaxial speakers in my '66 Ford Mustang. Drinking beer, then driving. All of it. It's a wonder I survived unscathed.
JP is a different kid than I was at 16. That's what I tell myself, anyway. I don't think he will take the chances I took as a young driver. With all of my heart, I hope he won't, anyway.
This is one of those times when being a control freak and averse to change is not helpful. I have no choice but to trust JP and have faith that he will be a careful driver. That he won't take unnecessary risks, like I did. That he won't drink and drive, like I did. That he won't drive and text or talk on his cellular telephone, like I do. That he won't race a train across the tracks on the way to a job loading and loading tractor trailers after his freshman year of college, like I did.
Most importantly, I have to have faith that God will watch over him, protect him from other drivers, and keep him safe. And He will. I know that.
Still, this feels like the beginning of a long goodbye, first to JP, and then to Joe. From the first sleep away camps at 10 or 11 to driving to, finally, college.
I don't think I'm ready for that, not by a long shot.
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