Tonight I am sitting on the precipice of significant changes.  Tonight I was reminded casually that tomorrow is Noah's last "first day of school".  I have been through this 4 other times, so I know it will be a bit emotional for me, but we will laugh after I finally get the best picture I can through my tears and in all likelyhood a crunched time limit because we will both press snooze one too many times.  I've been here.  He's been here, albeit watching as his sisters posed for their "Last first day" pictures.  But while I was prepping the coffee pot for the morning I was overcome with the reaslization that tomorrow is really my very last :first day of school" picture."  The last of five.  There will be no more of these moments.  Next year there will be none. 

 I'm not going to lie.  This is hard.

Not hard because I don't want them to grow up and leave home and become independent amazing people. 

 Not even beacause I long for the days that they were babies or even all still living at home.  

Lord knows those days were often chaotic, passed in a fog of exhaustion and prayer.  No one in their right mind really wants to relive those days, looking back at the pictures and videos is enough to satisfy that yen.  Or sitting next to a family with small,  children screaming in a restaurant. That works too. 

Going into tomorrow I am pulled back to the first, "first day of school" picture with Savannah.  All excitement and nervous energy, with her Pocahontas backpack and purple Gymboree dress. Holding our hands and walking confidently into Seymour Elementary, blissfully unaware of the GIANT camcorder on her dad's shoulder and both of our tears as we left her at the door, watching her walk to her desk and strike up a conversation with the girl to her left.  Later that day, watching as her bus drove right past our house and seeing her bewildered face  in the window.  Later greeting her as she flew down the bus steps to hug Fiona tighly,  then regaling us with all the excitement of her first day, and her relief that the bus driver finally figured out where she lived!  

All of the years since that first day, walking the next 4 kindergartners into the school, also following each of their siblings in the upper grades with the same huge camcorder, every year, the same emotional feelings of pride in who they were becoming and a little melancholy that our carefree days all  together had once again come to an end until the following summer.  

I've thought of the transition years from elementary to middle school and middle school to high school.  All the firsts.  All of the lasts.  All of the ordinary days in between.  There have been changes in our lives over those years.  Some small.  Some not so small and not so easy to face.  Some incredible. 

I've thought about all of the teachers, principals, secretaries, bus drivers and support staff who have had significant impact on these five kids over the course of these years.  The parties, field trips, the stories shared by teachers and others.  Recounting  acts of kindness, or misbehavior reported with "off the record" pride in one daughter's  loyalty to a friend and courage to slap the bully..although she could never know her princpal secretly wanted to thank her!   Good stuff.  Ordinary  life memories and people. 

Tomorrow Noah begins his last first day of school.  Springboarding into a year filled with firsts and lasts and so many events that will  mark this final year in this 13 year education process.  I am excited for him, knowing his gregarious nature, he is going to do his best to live fully in the moments this year will mark.  It's shaping up  to be a great year.  This last senior year. 

Meanwhile, I am doing my best to hold my shit together.  Prone to weeping in moments of joy and pride, tomorrow, and much of the rest of this year's experiences,  promise to be a veritable Super Bowl of emotion.   I'm steeling myself up for it.  Noah, on the other hand, has no clue what may be in store for him.  No clue that  the memories of his 4  siblings' school days, piled onto his, spanning twenty-three years are all bubbling up like a fount of parenting elixir inside of my head.  And heart.  

Change is a good thing, in the main.  Tonight as I sit here preparing  for tomorrow, I just can't stop wondering how it all changed and moved along so quickly.  Three things I never imagined on that first child's "first day of school";  ever having 5 children, and tomorrow, the very last "First day of school" and this damn stinging at the back of my eyes that I can't seem to control.  My only regret in all of this its that I don't still have that giant camcorder to follow him in with tomorrow! That would be spectacular.  And it was a great way to hide my tears!