Where the Story Ends

Being a parent makes time accelerate. As Luca gets older each day, I conjure up images of him in Jr. High, High School and going off to college. People keep telling me it will go fast so I'm trying to prepare myself. It makes me wonder, when will my story end?

Not that I'm going to have a premature death to end my story, but when will the adventure of my life become obsolete? That moment, around his nineteenth year, when Luca straps on a backpack, kisses his mom on the cheek and boards a plane for India, will my story be important anymore?

I see him on a rundown bus, staring out of a dirty window. And he captures the present. In that moment he feels his soul burst with inspiration and gratitude. And in that present, his present, my story ends. I become mother to a boy who is growing into a man.

I had that moment. I had many moments. Sitting under a palapa in Costa Rica, rain coming down in sheets around me, writing songs with a girl from Indiana. Standing on a bridge staring at a crocodile I paid 1 peso to see, speaking with a Mayan in Italian. Standing in the middle of the Utah desert with Lorenzo, staring into my Super 8 camera at him snapping photos with his old Diana, thinking, "damn, we're pretty cool." In my moments, I didn't reflect on what my parents were doing. To me, their stories ended when I was born. The stories of my dad promoting concerts in his mid-twenties and hanging out with the likes of Miles Davis and the Rolling Stones. That shit just didn't happen after he became a parent.

Yes, I get ahead of myself, Luca is only three months old. But this is the reality of parenthood. At some point we stop searching our souls for the reason we're here. We put that responsibility in the hands of our kids. That moment scares me. But at the same time, I am anxious to feel relieved of the burden of this constant search. I love my life and my family and at some point I want that to be enough for me.

I guess the goal is to somehow mesh our adventures. Hopefully our adventures will be his adventures until that nineteenth year when he kisses me on the cheek...