Departure.

Moving day was yesterday. It went pretty smoothly. Josie had us hitting the road at six in the morning, which got us there with about an hour to spare before the kids were allowed to move in. Her thought was that it would allow Ashes to get first dibs on the best bed in the room.

She was right, it did. I'm not sure if the parents of her two roommates were happy with that, since they have to share a bunk bed, for now (after two weeks, they will get the option to move to another room.) One of her room mates is Chinese and her parents don't speak a word of English. The other room mate is Spanish and seems to have her own circle of friends.

We loaded up her room, then went to buy some more stuff. Then, we went out to lunch. Then we said our goodbyes. I tried to stay strong, but of course I started blubbering as we said our goodbyes.

###

The texts started about an hour after we returned home.

"I wanna go home."

"I don't like it here with a bunch of people. And both my roomates are leaving on the weekends."

"I really want to come home on weekends."

I tried the best I could to be strong. Mostly, I allowed Corb to text and he was wonderful. The stuff he wrote was really inspiring and funny and it made me love him even more. He provided sound advice, like "Don't be a creeper and sit in the room all silent. Talk to your room mates about anything except Ted Bundey" (Ted Bundey is Ashes' favorite serial killer), and  my favorite, "You are going to be fine. We both know you are determined and smart...a dangerous combo. It's your first night. Stay in and relax. Tomorrow you will meet people...people in college want to meet others. It will get easier once you start class. So, recap: relax, sleep eat breakfast, explore the city, talk to anyone who seems friendly (excluding people who drive molester vans  or look like rapists) and have fun! It's time for your freedom!"

And then he typed...because he couldn't resist himself, I'm sure..."Oh, and no matter what people say, it's NOT your fault that you have a heavy flow and a wide set vagina."

Those of you who don't know the movie Mean Girls might find that last text message to be a little strange.

It didn't seem to help much, although she wasn't completely glum. She just kept going on about how she didn't have any friends and how she didn't want to stay there on week-ends.

Sigh. This is going to take a while. But I don't think it's a good idea for her to come home on week-ends, frankly. Nor can I see why she would want to! If I were a teenage boy and I had a college dorm to myself on week-ends...my God, you don't want to know WHAT would go on!

Maybe it's just different for girls. Or maybe she just needs some time to wake up and smell the freedom.

Rites of passage.

 This morning, I received the most distressing text of all.

"I haven't been able to poop in two days cause I can't do it with everyone else here."

Well, this didn't seem much of a problem to me. "Poop!" I wrote back. "Go to that bathroom and let out the biggest smelliest poop you can. Be proud of your waste products. That's what stalls are for."

"No," she wrote back. "They can still hear."

I couldn't help myself. "Who gives a shit?" I texted her.

She was not pleased with that response. "I don't have any friends as it is," she wrote back.

"Ashes says she's afraid to poop," I told my father later that day, as I was phoning to to wish him well before his ten day trip to Italy.

"That's not a big deal," laughed my father. "Tell her to bring a radio into the bathroom with her."

That didn't seem much of a solution to me. I think everyone else in the bathroom would figure out what was going on pretty quickly. 

"Tell her to run the faucet," he said. That seemed like an even worse solution. Of course, my dad had never lived in a dorm. He had always commuted to school. Maybe he didn't understand that these weren't private bathrooms.

"I told her that she should just go to the central campus and poop in anonymity," I laughed. "Or, she could just bring a book with her into the bath room and read it until everyone left the room. And then, poop away."

"Don't even give her advice," was Josie's advice. "She will poop when she needs to."

"I suppose she wouldn't wait until she explodes on her bed sheets," I said. "That would be even more embarrassing."

"You have to understand, it's like the start of a relationship," said Corb, as we were driving home from Wal-Mart. "When we first started living together, I would wake up early and brush my teeth before you woke up, so you wouldn't smell my morning breath.  Now, I just breathe all over you, and you've learned to love my morning stank."

I smiled, somewhat bitterly. "If only we could go back..."

Look, I know where she's coming from. But if one is sitting in one's bed, afraid to even poop, then one is not getting the most out of one's college experience, is one? It makes me worry about the next few days, and what she'll do once school starts. If she can't master the simple act of making a doody in a public setting, how will she possibly be able to master the rigours of a demanding college schedule?

I know, I know, I have to be strong. In some ways, she's like Annie's baby, Kaeden. She's like an infant, just learning to crawl, then walk. Just learning to be...well, be diaper trained. If I caved in, she'd never figure these things out on her own, she'd never succeed in college. She'd end up moving back to my place and living the rest of her life in the basement of my house, a ward of society, dependent on the public dole. A nonfunctioning, non-contributing member of society. And we can't have that, can we?

But...gahhhhh! It's so hard not to WANT to help. It's so hard not to worry. It's so hard to not find a solution for her, the way that I have on some many times in the past. That's what a parent does, right? Nurtures, encourages, helps. Helps, until a parent realizes that the act of doing so is counter-productive, that it doesn't allow a child to grow past a certain point. Ashes was at that point, and I had to just sit back, relax, and..

About two hours later, a follow-up text.

"I just walked to McDonalds to go poop."

Hmmm. Maybe my little girl's going to make something for herself, after all. 

As Corb pointed out, eventually she'll get sick of trekking all the way to McDonald's and will use the facilities that are (literally) right across from her room. 

So, another hurdle crossed. It's all part of life's rich fabric, I suppose. I should have known it would all work out. As someone wise once said (although perhaps not really about pooping at college), "this too shall pass."