On Saturday January 9, 2016
my daughter Alexandra
left. She moved to Washington DC from
Santa Barbara,
California where she's been living for the past eight years, to accept
a long overdue and well-deserved promotion in the company with whom she
works.
My travels
(which have been extensive) started shortly after I
completed
my first of two stints at college. It was January of 1971 in Cape Town,
South Africa
where I grew up. It was a different era then - both in the annals of
South Africa
and of
the world.
And one of the things which was radically different then was how we
viewed hitch-hiking and its associated risks.
Standing
at the side of the
road
with a backpack, sticking your thumb out, and accepting rides from who
knows who, going who knows where, may seem like an incredibly dangerous
occupation these days. But back then, it was not only not dangerous: it
was quite accepted, a
rite de passage.
I was twenty years old: bold, bullet-proof, and
fearless
- naïve too maybe, but you couldn't have convinced me of that. And
I was setting out to hitch-hike nearly fifteen hundred miles along
South Africa's
south to north east coast - the fabled Garden Route. I asked
my father
and
mother
to
drive
me out of town to the N2 main highway going east to north
along the coast (we called it the National
Road
in those days) and drop me off there, from where I would begin my
journey.
They did. They dropped me off, and I walked about a half a mile down
the
road
with my backpack without looking back,
stood
at the side of the road, stuck my thumb out at the passing cars ...
and waited for one to stop and give me a ride. And after I had been
standing
there for about three quarters of an hour, I looked back and noticed
my parents
were still
sitting
there in their car (it was a black Ford Zephyr 6
sedan, license plate number "CA 62624") at the side of the
road,
watching
me.
I wondered
why
they were still there. I wondered
why
they hadn't gone home yet.
When
Alexandra
left for Washington DC, it was the culmination of and the
completion
of many things. Although I could probably get myself to visit her in
Washington DC by plane faster than I could
drive
from
Napa Valley
to
Santa Barbara
when she lived there, I experienced the eightfold increase in distance
between us (from three hundred and fifty miles to two thousand eight
hundred miles) as a decisive break in the rich, ever-developing process
of our
relationship
which started when she was born, and went on to include everything I
did from then on to provide for her and for
my other children,
her brothers
Christian
and
Joshua:
their home
(our house),
private schooling, down payments on their first cars, college funds for
all three, and hopefully there was also some time left over to impart
to them a bit of what it takes to be decent
human beings.
Now, Washington DC seems like a long, long way away,
doesn't it? and will she be alright? and will she be safe?
and will she have everything she needs? and will she be protected? and
I just want to be near her so I can take care of her, and Oh
God
I miss her so much already ... you know, it's an endless
stream ie it's a barrage of automatic
concerns which, in spite of myself, I know I'll have to let go of.
That Was Me
I'm experiencing that je ne sais quois bittersweet feeling
which is equal parts
sadness
and equal parts
celebrated
accomplishment, triggered by my darling
Alexandra
leaving me, gone away to live her own life. And what comes
to
mindout of the blue (having not thought about this particular
incident in
decades)
is
my father
and
my mothersitting
at the side of the
road,
watchingme leave them.
It's
true.
That was it: I did leave them. When I hitch-hiked away from
them that day, my childhood with them and everything they had invested
in it and provided for me, was over - I was hardly ever back with them
after that. That was me leaving them.
Here's the thing:
Alexandra
leaving me, is actually a
victory.
It's a
victory
for her, having grabbed the horns of her
future
in both hands, and wrestled it into submission. And I
celebrate
her
victory
with her. Well Done, my gorgeous
Girly Girl!
Back then, it was a
victory
for me too, taking off that day, hitch-hiking by myself along the
Garden Route. I'm
clear
that was the day my
created
life started - even though I may not have articulated it in
quite those terms in those days.
That's the sweet component of the bittersweet
experience of saying goodbye to a child you've raised. But what I
didn'tget
about
my parents
back then, was the bitter component of their experience.
It was more than that actually. It was I didn't realize there
was a bitter component ... until I experienced it myself
when my own child left me. And when I
got
that (it took me forty five years to
get
it - but I did get
get
it), something very profound in my
relationship
with
my father
and
my mother
finally clicked into place: I saw (at a
completely
new level) how much they
love
me, how much I
love
them, and how much I appreciate what they did for me.
In
the quietness
of this realization, I saw
how like them I
am.
I apologized (like a
prayer)
to them for (inadvertently, it would seem - if not innocently) how
inconsiderate it was of me to ride
rough-shod
over their losing me, totally crass and insensitive to their loss, all
in the name of the start of my big adventure.
Rather it's just the
completion
inherent in and intrinsic to the circle of
Life
turning (and turning out) as it always does, from all
parents
to their
children
- ongoingly and always and forever.