If you've been following my blog, you'll know that I've been breaking my heart over my son,
Balthazar,
going away to college in August. The first two weeks were the hardest. Then I experienced a
Cesar Millan "TSHHHT!" moment when The Kid Returned.
About a week after my Dad, Sis, and I took Balthy upstate to his new school, he e-mailed me that there was a concert in Manhattan the following Friday and asked if I would buy the ticket for him. He said he'd take one of the college's shuttle buses to the nearest
Metro-North Railroad station (about 40 minutes away from campus), train it down to Grand Central Terminal, rock out at the show, then return to our little village and chill with me for the weekend.
What joy knew my heart! With what pleasure did I anticipate my baby's return! What a kick in the ass that following week (and his visit) proved to be!!!
I bought/e-mailed him the concert ticket. I bought him a ten-trip train ticket, so he wouldn't have to spend any of his own cash, figuring he'd be able to use it on subsequent visits home. I sent it to him via Priority Mail. I checked in with him that Wednesday, to see if he'd received the ticket and which shuttle/train combo he'd be taking on Friday. Wouldn't you know it; the shuttle buses weren't yet running, and
wouldn't be till the returning students arrived (he was up there for a three-week workshop required of all freshman, so school was not officially in session, and the kids were discouraged from leaving campus during those three weeks, hence, no shuttle buses). He figured he'd take a cab. A 40-minute cab ride which'd cost at least $40, if not more. (He, of course, didn't realize this.)
I advised him that this was a heinously stupid expenditure and told him to research public transport options. This he did, and presented me with findings of this bus, to that bus, to the train, and he'd have to miss the afternoon session of the workshop. Well, to summarize from here, I lost my cool, told him I thought better of him bussing around a NY countryside with which he was
wholly unfamiliar, and that if he felt comfortable blowing his own money on the cab, he'd be better off doing so. But I was SO ANNOYED with his lack of foresight and completely stressed about him possibly getting stuck somewhere. (You know, if you get stuck in Manhattan, it's a sure bet you can find someone to point you in the right direction, and if not, cabs can be easily found just about anywhere. You get stuck in the country and what's around to help you? Fuck-all but cows. Maybe the
Children of the Corn, too. But mostly cows.) GAH!
The whole time he communicated his movements to me that Friday, he snarked at me, and was just generally being such a tool that by the time he made his way home from Manhattan I very nearly told him to see if one of his friends in town could put him up for the night. But I didn't. I just expressed my maternal displeasure and with relief saw him spend most of that Saturday out with his friends. I'd cooled off by the time he got back, in the wee hours of Sunday morning, and we finally exchanged some pleasant words. Then he said to me, "Mommy, I miss my college..."
Internally, I died. Externally, I said, "Tell me about that."
And he was all, "Well, I know I've only been away for two weeks, but coming back from Manhattan tonight, walking to our building, everything was familiar but already feels...alien to me. School just feels like home, now."
That little rat
bastard.
Without conscious thought, and completely surprising myself, I answered, "Good. That means you've settled in and are happy there. I'd worry if you told me you hated it and wanted to come home. I'm really glad you feel that way."
And he nodded and went to bed. And I cried a little and then got over it.
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Balthy makes his girlie sniff some God-awful cologne. |
He returned again just this past weekend (so, two weeks after this first return), AND HE BROUGHT HIS NEW GIRLFRIEND WITH HIM!!!!!
She's adorable; a sweet blonde gal who laughed at all my lame jokes and with whom I enjoyed a
Buffy the Vampire Slayer marathon on
Chiller (as well as swooning over
Spike—
woof!) while Balthazar packed up the remaining contents of his room. Yesterday, while she showered before they took their leave, I said to him, "I notice you put a pic of the two of you as your Facebook profile page. You've never put pics of your girlfriends up before, she must be extra special to you, huh?"
He nodded, then jerked his head toward the bathroom. "So, what do you think?"
"I like her," I offered, then nibbled on my breakfast a bit before asking, "does it matter what I think?"
"Yeah," he said. He folded a towel, then nodded again. "Yeah."
"Well, in that case," I said, "I like her a
lot."