The Not-Quite-Empty Nest

Now that summer's ending, it’s time to
visit the whole empty nest concept again. It turns out to be even more complicated than I thought when I wrote about it for Chicken Soup for the Soul, back in 2008. At that time two of my sons had already moved out and my youngest was a senior in high school. I knew that for the first time in 24 years, my husband and I would be facing life without kids.

Anticipating how much we'd miss them, and the life we had when we were all together, we decided to make a pre-emptive strike. We sold our house in the suburbs and moved to the country. Our hope was that hard work in a new setting would help take some of the sting out of the adjustment phase. We would spackle over the empty spots in the nest with our own projects and challenges. And in the end we would have a new kind of life we had built together, just the two of us, just as we did when we were first married.

But it didn’t exactly work out that way. It seems that “empty” is one of those fluid words, at least in the context of the nest. Over the past two years, all three of our sons have lived with us for short periods of time. It's ironic, given that one of our primary reasons for moving was to live in a house that wasn’t filled with memories of them.

It turns out that we were wrong about that part. In fact, their presence here has helped make this house feel like home, in a way that wouldn’t have happened otherwise. They’ve helped us strip wallpaper (ugh, a job I hope never to have to do again as long as I live!), put in a vegetable garden, build a waterfall in the backyard, install shelves in the basement, even stack hay in the barn.

On a practical level, this help has been invaluable. But the true value is in the pleasure of working side by side with them, talking about everything and nothing, admiring their skills and their confidence, appreciating the good and accomplished young men they’ve become. It's a unique experience, living with your children again, getting to know them after they’ve moved away and have come back all grown up. It's something we never anticipated but feel lucky to have had.

It's also gratifying that all three have been comfortable and happy here. They've taken to this peaceful country setting in a way they never would have before, when their lives revolved around friends, school, sports and a million other activities. And since they’ve each lived here for a time, they don’t feel like they’re just visiting Mom and Dad’s house—they feel like they’re coming home.

The downside? Besides having to share a bathroom with boys again? For me it’s that the process of letting them go has been prolonged. Each time one of them stays for a few weeks or months, our lives take on a new rhythm. We learn to share the bathroom and the washing machine. We help take care of each others’ pets. We remember that a large pizza will barely go around, let alone provide a few days of leftovers as it used to do. We watch family movies and laugh about the old days. I never get tired of looking into those grown-up faces and seeing my sweet little boys there.

But then the day comes when their plans take them away again. For me this just never gets easier. While helping them pack I’m already anticipating the loss. Then for weeks afterward I bump into it at every turn—their car no longer in the driveway, their cat or dog not there to greet me when I get home from work, their favorite foods now sitting uneaten in the cupboard.

And it’s not as if they are just moving across town—currently they live in three different states, none of them ours. I think it's this "all or nothing" aspect that makes it so hard for me. Either they actually live in my house or they are far away—there's no in between. Now we won’t all be together again until Christmas time, and that’s only if the stars align.

So here we are, my husband and I, once again comforting each other. We know that having our sons here for a while has been worth the grief of seeing them go again. We also know that there are much worse things than having a family that misses each other when they’re apart.

Now it's time to adjust to the suddenly quiet house again and to start making plans for the fall. As some incredibly wise (though somewhat naive) person once wrote in her story for Chicken Soup: "After all, life doesn’t run backward. There is only forward. There is only the never-ending challenge of keeping your balance. I know I'll be fine if I just keep pedaling." I think it's a lesson I'll need to learn over and over again, at least for a little while longer.