Bye Bye Bruce

This week I got a new car, which is always an exciting thing, but his week I said goodbye to Bruce... the old car. The memories and emotions I experienced this week as we traded in the old Honda Odyssey were completely unexpected, and yet an interesting reflection on where we have been as a family over the last decade. Ironically, the show Modern Family had a storyline this week about getting rid of an old station wagon and what it means to let that bit of your life go. The episode made me realize maybe we weren’t all that crazy to be a little sad to say goodbye.

When we got the van we had one child, but I was expecting our second. I remember Jason and I were both amazed that we were going to be one of those families with a van, car seats and sippy cups rolling around. It was a new stage in our lives in many ways, primarily with me becoming a full-time stay at home mom. Jason finally was happy with his work, we were settled, and it was our first new car. We had made it. Shiny new minivan in the driveway, gas grill on the deck and two handsome boys. The world was our oyster.

A year later we moved, added another baby and I was thanking my lucky stars for that van with the power doors that you could open with a baby in your arms and a toddler holding your hand. We didn’t yet call it Bruce, that came a few years later when Alanya christened him after the bumbling gray shark in the movie Finding Nemo. It fit, and it stuck.

I can’t begin to imagine the number of hours I have spent in that car, or the memories we have logged in it. Four round-trip drives to Florida. More trips to New Jersey than can be counted. The number of times we have cleaned vomit out of it. The cold baseball games I have watched from inside of it. All the carpool lines I waited in. The screaming I’ve done. The laughs that were laughed. The jokes told. All the happy places it brought us to.

There were many years we had all three kids in car seats and over the last year or two, not only are we down to one, but our oldest can now sit in the front. How did that happen? Where did the time go? A decade gone by. Just like that.

It has been good times, and these are different times. As we sat in the car dealership doing paperwork I looked out and my boring, gray, reliable van sat next to my flashy, shiny, red car, and I got a little sad. A happy sad though. New car, new chapter, new memories.

Another First Day

Back to school.... again. I'm not quite sure where the summer went, but I do know everyone here was ready for the kids to go back. I love this time of year, and always feel a sense of excitement and renewal. Maybe that's the student in me still trying to come out. Usually about a week before the first day I start making lists of lunch box ideas, dinners to make, outfits for the kids to wear. This year I didn't.

I didn't know why this year was different. I was very laid back right up to the night before. Transition the kids back into an early bedtime? They'll adjust. Go out and get new clothes? It's hot now, and won't be in a few weeks, why bother. I was cool as a cucumber.

It wasn't until the kids had gone to bed the night before the first day that it hit me. This was the first First Day of School ever that I didn't have a child making a major transition. I actually got out a piece of paper to write it all down to make sure. Last year Noah started middle school. Before that Alanya started first grade. Before that Ben started first and Alanya kindergarten. Before that Ben started kindergarten. And so on, back through first days of preschool all the way to Noah starting school. I was sort of amazed.

So this year I have a third grader, a fourth grader and a seventh grader. All big kids. How did that happen? They all love school and are happy to be there. I must have done something right with all those lists I used to make.