A Good Day

Some days are just good days, and in a world on fire those days should be cherished.

Friday was a good day.

For one thing, Lauren came home from her most recent travels. She has become a global wanderer, someone who will set out with a backpack and half an itinerary and spend weeks knocking about in hostels and sleeper buses in countries far outside the usual orbit of Americans in the world. Fortunately she has a job where this is regarded as professional development, so they were happy to see her go and happy to see her return. She was gone for eight weeks, bopping around the planet on her own, and it was good to see her again. 

I’m genuinely impressed that she can do this. It would never have even occurred to me that this was an option when I was her age, let alone as something I might actually do.

At some point soon perhaps she’ll let me do another post or two about this year’s travels like I did last year, and if so I’ll be happy to put it up here. This blog has become a central repository for family stories and it would be good to preserve them here.

I drove down to the airport Friday afternoon and picked her up at Terminal 5 because that’s where flights that require Customs come in. I’m getting used to that routine now. Drive down. Hang out in the cell phone lot with my book and my phone to scroll through until the WhatsApp message comes in, and then head over to the Arrivals area. 

We had a lovely ride home together.

It has to be said that if that had been me arriving I’d still be immobile in the living room, but she is young and strong and has been busy reconnecting with friends since she got back.

For another thing, Friday was the day that Oliver presented a paper at a conference.

If you’re not familiar with the rituals of the emerging academic, this is one of the more important ones. It’s how you establish yourself within the scholarly community that you wish to become part of, and to be honest it’s something that I never actually did, which probably should have clued me in to the improvisatory nature of my future academic career.

One of his friends in his program found a graduate student conference on a subject that particularly interested them and which, it turned out, was broad enough to include a seminar paper that Oliver had done the previous semester. So he revised and polished it, and on Friday there he was, presenting at an actual academic conference.

He sent us photos, which we appreciated greatly, and we got to talk with him about it in between the events of the day. 

Apparently after he spoke, another attendee approached him and told him that his paper had answered a question he didn't even think to ask, which is high praise among academics.

My children have exceeded me, and that’s how it’s supposed to work. You raise them to be independent, accomplished adults and then they turn into independent, accomplished adults doing things you never could, and you sit there and think, “Where did the time go?” Except you know where it went, and you know how well it was spent. 

I am proud of Oliver and Lauren. 

It was a good day.