Separation 101: The college freshman returns

(with a laundry list of behavior tips for parents and several loads of laundry)

Here are the rules: Do not speak to my friends. Prepare meals but do not expect me for dinner. Clean up my messes but do not harangue me about my laundry (or dirty cups or bowls, and no, I do not know how that empty bottle of wine got behind my bed!) Do not ask me to put away my laundry after you have washed and folded it. Do not make me feel unwelcome by expressing your exasperation/resentment at the extra work caused by my presence. You are the one who wanted children. I didn’t ask to be born. You raised me. It’s your fault if I’m selfish and demanding.

But it’s not all bad. Sometimes she is bright and cheerful. Especially when I am driving her to the airport for a week’s vacation in California. At those moments we are to forget the discordant times and give unflagging attention to her academic and other achievements.

She has presented a paper to Harvard scholars, become a peer mentor, received the President’s Award scholarship, sung in a musical revue at the college. (We are not allowed to mention those accomplishments outside of the secure enclave of home. It is embarrassing, Mom! )

She is not the only one who behaves this way. Her friends, who once crowded at my knees, now shrink from my welcoming embrace. They are glamorous sophisticates now. In the reflection from their designer sunglasses, I seem a foolish old crone.

In the past, they admired my sewing skills, my stews and puddings, my poetry. Now, they have internships at big non-profits on Madison Avenue. The women they admire wear high-heels and get manicured on Fridays.

My daughter will not go that route. She will spend her summer—a long one that begins in early May and ends in late August—renovating an apartment in the East Village that she will simultaneously live in, eschewing the comforts of a home on the Delaware River. She will use the skills learned in post-Katrina New Orleans to build walls, mudding and taping her way through a hot city summer. For extra cash, she plans to sling yogurt at a local Pinkberry shop. I dare not suggest resume-building like her friends, lest I be chastised for abandoning my liberal principles. Viva la proletariat!

Her brother, for whom she once pined while away at college, is now a huge pain. He thinks he can tell her how to behave. How dare he! He, who once ate Cheez-Wiz from the jar now espouses fresh fruits and protein for healthy living, denouncing her passion for sweets.

Dare I say the adjustment has not been easy? Somehow, my husband has escaped everyone’s wrath. This must be the result of the male gene for disengagement. Rather than face a problem head-on, he ties it up in a large storage bag and flings it in the back of the closet. No, that’s not a metaphor, it’s reality. Faced with a childhood’s accumulation of stuff, which I would be inclined to confront individually, piece by furry piece, assessing its future value and past meaning, he stuffs it all in a bag and sucks the air out with a vacuum cleaner. Poof! Instant memory bag.

Soon, I trust, the dust will settle around here. We will find our way back to our family routine, where all the children are above average, all the men are good-looking, and the Mom is a witless crone.