When our boys are away at school we are practitioners of the Sunday night phone call ritual. In the age of cell phones, I’m not entirely sure how or why this age-old tradition has taken hold for us, but it has.
Most weeks John, our college senior, calls somewhere between 7 and 9 p.m. He updates us on the week that was. His mother passes along the news from extended family, fishes for random bits of information about his social life, and covers the transactional business (e.g. banking, online shopping, doctors’ appointments that need scheduling, etc.). I ask about the weekend, we talk sports (usually the Red Sox as well as some other seasonal happening – how his fantasy football team fared, March Madness, etc.), and make travel arrangements for when he comes home on breaks.
Henry, the high school senior away at boarding school, usually calls between 9:30 and 11 p.m. depending on how much homework he has and his R.A. duties. Those calls tend to play out in very similar fashion to the ones we have with his brother except that we talk a little less about sports and a little more about his work on student government.
Mostly the Sunday night calls are about checking in and staying connected. The conversations are largely predictable and mostly a source of comfort for mom and dad. I’m pretty sure the boys count on them too, though in a way that is no doubt quite different. It is part obligation – we are paying the bills so it is important to humor us along the way. It is part necessity – they need a prescription filled or a form signed or the psychology book they left at home over break sent to campus ASAP! On occasion the calls are about reassurance – seeking parental wisdom or comfort or affirmation. And sometimes, the Sunday night call is just a huge pain in the ass – a series of grunts, sighs, and one syllable responses uttered in the same tone of voice you use with the automated phone menu when you’re trying to correct the same error that has appeared on your cable bill for three straight months.
We’re lucky. We hardly ever have pain-in-the-ass calls with either of our boys (at 18 and 22 that moniker may be past due, but I figure as long as they’re in school I can get away with it). And when the bad calls happen it is always understandable – Henry is grinding out a particularly unpleasant academic assignment or John is fighting a cold or the like. So, when we hear the sighs and the grunts and the tone, we tell them we love them and end the calls quickly. And that seems to work out.
Except when it doesn’t.
Except when one of us has had a particularly crappy day or week and we’ve been looking forward to the Sunday night calls. When we especially miss having them around – dirty dishes and discarded socks strewn around the house notwithstanding – and are counting on hearing about their weeks and the papers they are writing and laughing together about some funny anecdote that will lift us up and bolster us and carry us forward.
Getting a pain-in-the-ass call on one of those days is the worst. Because when you’re the parent you don’t get to grunt or sigh or cop a snarky tone with your kid who is having a bad day. It’s in the contract. The party of the first part (i.e. parent) is prohibited from whining, complaining, or laying a guilt trip on the party of the second part (i.e. child) when the party of the second part is away at school and having a bad day. No exceptions. You can look it up.
So, what’s the point?
The point is, if you’re anything like us, as the semester winds down and the holidays approach, there’s a pretty good chance that you may start missing your away-at-school child even more than usual. And after shoveling the frickin’ snow at the end of the driveway three times before work, standing behind someone with 27 items in the 14 items or less line at the grocery store, and having your boss drop one more thing on your desk that needs to be done yesterday, you can’t wait to talk with your John or Henry. To hear about the exam they just took or the play they went to on Saturday night or to ask them what they want for dinner the first night they’re home. Only it’s the end of the term and they are stressed about the papers they’re writing and the printer isn’t working and dinner in the dining hall completely sucked and, and, and…
The point is that call isn’t going to be the pick-me-up you needed. And you don’t get to gripe about it. In fact, you have to do your best to downshift into your pick-them-up gear. It is totally unfair. But that’s just how it goes.
Here’s the good news though. The semester is almost over and they will be home before you know it. You will have 2 – 4 weeks of your away-at-school kid sleeping until noon, lying on your couch, drinking milk from the carton, and leaving the toilet seat up (ok, that’s usually just a boy thing, but you know what I mean). You will have so much quality time with them that by New Year’s you will be counting the days until they go back to school and you can have your house back.
Happy holidays!
