Moving on from the Minivan

I got a new car this weekend.
It really was far beyond time, being that the entire back trunk panel of the van I had been driving had fallen off on the inside right into my hands, and the windshield was cracked, and the sliding doors no longer would always slide.
There was also the screeching every time it backed up that worked like an alert system to our neighborhood that we would be gone for a little while.
They probably did relieved sighs.
The brakes were getting dangerous, and one headlight kept going out, so we decided to look into finding something else safer and newer for me to drive.

Once we had, we spent the morning as a family cleaning the old van out.
I knew it was about to be an adventure when my husband, head down near the third row floorboard, called out to ask me if he might interest me in a half of a petrified quesadilla.
Poor guy.
He doesn’t understand the thug minivan life.

I had seen a post asking people to reveal they were a parent without saying the actual words.
Had I seen that post yesterday I would have submitted for the record a picture of the cup reading “fresh grapes” that we would end up finding under the middle row
that was now a cup of raisins.

“Oh yeah,” my youngest said, watching the unearthing of the cup.
“That’s from when we went to Chico this summer. Oops. I’ll clean it up.”

As we sorted I thought over every road trip we’d taken,
the floor covered in sand from the beach,
opening the back to put kid’s backpacks inside…
I remembered when I had to buckle the girls into booster seats, and how they looked with their heads bent far over sideways when they fell asleep on the ride.

One bag for trash and one for filling with things we’d keep.
I almost threw a paper away,
but then I opened it to realize it was an ultrasound strip.
I had to squint to read the date.

I realized it was of my daughter, Chloe, now nearly 14.
I had grabbed baby books with photo albums when we’d evacuated the wildfire this fall.
That strip must have somehow fallen out and stayed.

I sat there looking at it for a long time, remembering the struggle it had been to get pregnant with her, and the devastating miscarriage before we did that had sent me spiraling into deep depression.
How I’d nearly been left completely empty from how much I had cried.
But then I saw how sadness and disappointment can be replaced with joy,
and with life.

In those three black and white photos, sitting in that van for the last time,
I saw my life from there to here, and I smiled.

I never expected to feel so much leaving behind that old silver mini van on the dealership lot.
My new car, so nice and shiny,
but that old van has held a whole lot.

It felt kind of like looking at a scrapbook, full of hundreds of memories.
Every door ding, every carpet stain just a sign of my own life to me.

It stings sometimes to leave things like that behind when you’re a mom.
To see your crib that held three of your babies sitting in a garage sale pile…
no more strollers, or under-table messes to clean,
no more food cut into tiny bite sized pieces,
no more soft-scented baby bath time…

We parent in so many different phases, and my identity has been tied up in my last one.
I don’t know who I am as a mom of all bigger kids.
I have always hated change, and I don’t know what comes after this minivanless one.

Last night was a hard night with the girl in that ultrasound strip.
She and I have been going through it for a few rounds.
We stood at her door saying goodnight to each other, both feeling distant;
Each one of us hesitant to be the softest, most truthful with our feelings, or most vulnerable one.

When you hug your young teenagers sometimes they feel like they’re made of brittle bird bones;
Like they’ll break clean in half if you hug them too hard,
and also like one wrong move and they could turn to stone,
but little did she know as we stood there I’d held her ultrasound in my hand that very morning.
That treasured thing I’d grabbed to save from a fire like a soft whispered reminder,
“For her you’d do anything.”

From the first glimmer of her she has been a most important thing to me.
Something I’d take with me above other earthly things.

From before I saw her, or held her, or worried over her I had loved her;
From that first doctor’s office screen.

I know she will never understand a mother’s love until she is one one day, herself,
but today one last way that old minivan transported me
was to remind me of a day that I’d gained a few drops of the deep ocean that I now hold in my hand.

Now I will move on to a whole new phase:
New places, new bigger kid things,
but I’ll never forget how an old broken down minivan reminded me, on a day I would end up needing it, of the way that sometimes things that ended up being beautiful, and new
started out first looking like all they were
was a mess.

This article was written by a guest blogger. The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions of Bob Lacey, Sheri Lynch or the Bob & Sheri show.

Mom Outnumbered

Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.