Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Silence Isn't Golden

So, I am really bad at this blogging thing.  I know- surprise!
Anyway- an "incident" today brought this little "home for my thoughts" back to my memory, so here I am.
So the incident went as follows:
My eldest is working out at a local sports center called Jack City. It's a great place with some awesome folks running the program he is doing. Pretty intense stuff, and quite a level of commitment is all but required.  So, since he is only 15, we have to shuttle him there and back.
Today, not unlike any other Wednesday, we get home from school, he holes himself in his room for a little R&R before his workout.
The time rolls around to leave and I get in the van, pull out of the garage, and sit in the driveway- waiting on him to come out.
(About a month ago he ordered these headphones that are the bomb-diggity. They just arrived a few days ago and have been attached to his head every free moment.)
So, he hops in the van, with headphones covering his ears. I did not notice, as I was watching for cars as I backed out of our crazy dangerous (well, sort of) driveway.
As we slowly drove away from the house, down the main road in our neighborhood, I began a conversation that he could not hear. That was when it hit me- the once noisy (glorious) cacophony that he once participated in, is now a voice short. He has traded the outer world's conversations and noise for solitude in his world.
In his defense, he did realize that I was trying to speak to him and removed the headphones to ask me, "what?," but it was too late. I was too far into the realization of where we now stand.
Memories of days gone by, when it was just him and me in the van (before the rest of the cacophony was born) and he would  talk my ear off, sing his favorite songs at the top of his lungs, ask question after question.... and sometimes just hum himself to sleep flooded my thoughts and I had to fight back the overwhelming emotion that those memories brought.   Long gone are those days with him.
He is nearing the end of his Freshman year of Rhetoric (High) School, which means we only have about 3 years left to talk, sing, ask and hum with him daily.
"They" say it goes by fast, and boy, were they right.