My youngest son graduated high school over the weekend. I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about it. I’m proud of him and I’m excited to see what he does and where he goes from here, but on the other hand, it’s kind of sad to know he’ll be leaving the nest soon. He’s going to go to the local community college next year, though, so he’s helping his mother and me by breaking away slowly.
He’ll still be living at home, so it won’t be as abrupt a change as the one his older brother left us with. And that’s a good thing, both for Logan and for his mom and me.
The biggest change is going to be that we won’t have athletic events to go to every weekend – and sometimes on weeknights. Logan was in cross country, wrestling and track, and some of those events cut into hunting and fishing time. Now that we won’t be driving halfway across the state to sit on bleachers and watch athletics, we can instead drive halfway across the state to sit on fallen logs and watch for game animals emerging from the woods.
Granted, we’ll still have some athletic events to go to. Logan got involved in precision shooting a few years ago, and that’s one sport you can keep doing long after you’ve finished high school. In fact, he got me into it, too, so for some of those events, I won’t just be going to watch – I’ll be competing, too. However, I won’t be competing at as high a level as Logan is, and that means there’ll be plenty of matches I’m there to just watch. But they won’t cut into our hunting time as much as the school sports – and they’ll actually make us better for our hunting trips.
It’s still weird thinking I don’t have any kids in school anymore, though. When did I get this old?
