Wow. You’ve made it! You’re a college graduate. And although college graduation didn’t come without its struggles, it was certainly worth it.
Seriously, I never thought I’d see this day. Not because I ever doubted your abilities, but because I doubted my own parenting skills. I didn’t know if I would have the patience or the strength to see you through it. If only I had known then what I know now….
You’re probably aware that I have never been patient. Maybe it’s in my DNA (the Schmucker side; not the Drerup side). I wasn’t patient in high school and I wasn’t patient in college. I was ready to move out and move on. I was, however, somewhat patient in my relationships. I waited to have a serious relationship until I graduated from college, and when the first serious relationship didn’t pan out for me, I started seeing your dad. Looking back, maybe your dad was too young to be married then (he was only 22) and I was getting impatient (there’s that vice again) about having kids. I was 27, and I was getting the itch to become a mother before I turned 30. We got married, were happily married, and you were born two years after we said our vows. I was 29½ when you were born. See? I had been fairly patient. Being a mother was such a blessing, but I had so many doubts about my skills. I just wanted to be sure I was doing it right. Whatever “right” parenting was.
As a newborn just home from the hospital, you refused to sleep much and you cried. Sometimes you cried a lot. I thought it was something I was doing wrong or not doing at all. It turns out you were a bit colicky as an infant. When your stomach was upset, you cried. When YOU cried a lot and couldn’t be immediately comforted, I cried, too. I was new at this parenting thing, and I was nervous that I was doing everything wrong and that you’d grow up to be one of those spoiled, over-indulged, over-stimulated, enabled brats who would never be happy. (Yeah, you were only an infant. But I still worried about it….) But once you outgrew the colic, I realized that you really were a good baby. When you were so little, people wanted to hold you, but I was hesitant to let others hold you. You were mine, and I wanted you to like me the best. I wanted to be your best “holder”. I was your MOM.
When you were 8 weeks old and my maternity leave was exhausted, you started daycare in Lubbock. The first day that you were scheduled to be there, I went in, dropped you off, AND THEN I CRIED ALL THE WAY TO WORK. I shouldn’t have, because you loved daycare. You liked being around all the other littles. You enjoyed socializing even before you could walk. You found those social skills early on.
When you were 6 months old, your dad started working for United, so we moved from Lubbock to Amarillo. You started daycare in Amarillo, and again, you loved the social interaction there. I worked in an office just upstairs from your daycare, and I could watch you on the playground area from my office. It was an ideal situation for me as a working mom. I felt so blessed to be your mom. Later on, we moved from an apartment to a rent house, where we had a yard. You had a puppy. You had a mini-pool. And you learned to drive the motorized Jeep at the age of 2 ½. You were such a boy in all the things you loved: dogs, cars, dirt/mud, trucks, balls, swimming pools, airplanes…..and food. ALL food. And you could shit like a big man from the time you turned 2. —O.M.G.– You were difficult as hell to potty-train because you were too busy to take a break from playing. When others chastised me because you were almost 3 years old and still not potty-trained, I told myself that I shouldn’t be in such a rush for you to grow up. You were my son, and I wasn’t ready for you to grow up just yet….I wanted to make your toddler years last a while. I wanted to enjoy you as a little.
And then your sister was born, so the need to have you potty-trained became more of a pressing issue. Eventually you learned. I think it was the red cowboy boots that we used to bribe you into success. But, hey, it worked. Plus, since you pooped like a big man even then, it probably was an inconvenience for you to sit and play with your cars and trucks and planes with a big ol’man-sized turd in your britches….so by potty-training you, I did you a favor; and realistically, we couldn’t afford to have two kids in diapers at the same time. Your timing was just right. You were gonna grow up with or without my consent.
So—your sister was born, my maternity leave with Bailee was over, then your dad was transferred to Dumas with United. We were happily married, and we bought a house in Dumas, and for the next 20 months I drove back and forth to Amarillo every weekday. Because as much as I loved being a mom, I thought I was a better mom when I wasn’t doing it ALL DAY, EVERY DAY. Being a fulltime mom was too stressful for me. You were a good passenger in those days because you were fascinated by all the trucks on the commute, and there were plenty of them. Your sister didn’t much care for the trucks, though, but she was still an infant, and for a while, you were able to entertain her long enough to keep her in her car seat. When you were almost 5 years old, I quit working in Amarillo (and stopped commuting 100 miles every day) so I would be able to enjoy you as you started kindergarten in Dumas. I had loved my job in Amarillo, but I certainly didn’t want to miss your growing-up years in Dumas. You were already growing up waaaaay too fast for me. I wanted to miss NOTHING as your mother.
From the very beginning, you loved school. You have always loved school. You became fast friends with Clark, Harrison, Ricky, Sara, and Kaitlin. After a half-day at kindergarten, you’d go spend the afternoons with Kelly Gerber, Rylan, Reghan, and Annie while your dad and I were still at work. You were definitely 100 percent boy, so you’d find trouble every now and then, but nothing major. Your teachers at Hillcrest found you to be energetic, social, fun, and ornery. I recall being called to school to meet with your principal, Mrs. Ledbetter, on more than one occasion, with the funniest time being when you accidentally (?) dropped your hot dog in the Hillcrest cafeteria and “wagged” it inappropriately in front of you as you picked it up to put it back on your food tray. (I’m pretty sure this may have paved the way for Mrs. Ledbetter’s retirement.) Or maybe it was the pissing incident in the Hillcrest bathroom floor drain. Not sure. If it wasn’t a school day, you’d invite other kids on the block to come to our house and play, or they’d invite you to play at theirs. Either way, your days in Dumas were full of fun and “boy” things. Your playmates LOVED you. You completed kindergarten through 4th grade at Hillcrest with tons of friends along the way.
Dumas was so good to our family. We all had so many great friends and neighbors there. But as your fourth grade year ended, United promoted your dad to Amarillo, and we begrudgingly left behind our home and friends in Dumas to move to Bushland, America. We knew very little about Bushland at the time, except that the school was excellent, it was small and the homes were on rural acres, but it was close to Amarillo and nearer to some of our other family members. Regardless, we embraced the move, and you started fifth grade (“middle school” in Bushland) and your sister started second grade at the elementary school. During our first year there, there was a vote to build a high school in Bushland (which your dad and I both favored). The vote passed, and immediately the construction was begun for Bushland High School. You found quick friends in Brandon Winters, Hunter Smith, Chris Key and Doug Steinkruger, who all lived in Prairie West, where we lived, too. We loved living in Bushland.
Meanwhile, you became interested in sports at Bushland, surrounded by the likes of Chance Cornelius, Chay Gerber, and James Faulkner, and later, Sterling Kiper and Brett Wilhelm and Tate Rhodes. Until the move to Bushland, sports had not been very important to you. Suddenly, as you started 6th grade, football/basketball/baseball were almost all you could think about.
But then the divorce happened.
As much stress as parenting gave me, becoming a suddenly-single parent gave me even more stress. I was completely blindsided by what happened in our marriage, and I apologize that you and Bailee had to suffer along with me. Your dad had worked so many hours with United and had been gone so much during our marriage that I should have become accustomed to doing all or most of the parenting myself; however, the financial ramifications of the divorce were much more burdensome than my time limitations. I was also making less money at the time of our divorce than I had made since very early in my working career. I was never MORE WORRIED about parenting than I was then. I was terribly concerned that I wouldn’t be able to provide the love and financial support as a single parent that I was able to provide to you while I was married to your dad. As bad and dark as the divorce years were for me, I can only imagine how much darker they were for you as our child. I was ill-prepared to be a single mother and I had not adequately prepared you or your sister to live within a split parenting situation. (Really. I had no idea that our marriage was about to end.) I am sorry. I am beyond sorry. Divorce forced you and Bailee into adult situations before you could be expected to do adult things. I was merely coping on a day-to-day basis the best I could, and I didn’t do it as well as I would have liked. As painful as our split was, however, I learned some very valuable life lessons from it. I hope you did as well.
In hindsight, your dad became a much better father after our divorce. For that, I am thankful. I believe that I also became a better parent after the divorce, although I still worried that I wasn’t parenting you as I was supposed to. For the many times since the divorce when I failed to be a good role model to you, I am sorry. I made some very bad decisions out of anger and spite and even loneliness, but I hope that you NEVER—for one minute—doubted how much I loved you and your sister. I have always and will always want nothing but the absolute best for you!
Moving out of our Bushland house and moving into a tiny house in Amarillo may have crushed my spirit at the time, but I was/am so blessed that Superintendent Lemons allowed you and Bailee to continue to attend Bushland schools. From 2004 until your high school graduation in 2011, each year became gradually easier for me. During those years, you prodded me to recreate who I was as a parent and as a person and you helped me to become the best single mom version of myself.
And then, your successes in junior high and high school football, baseball, track, Student Council, and academics convinced me that we had done the right thing in allowing you and Bailee to continue to go to school in Bushland even though the traveling between home/work in Amarillo and school in Bushland was a hardship for me. What I’m saying is that YOU and YOUR SUCCESS as a student allowed me to find the version of me that I really liked. Once I saw that you and Bailee were going to be okay, I was okay, too. And I admit that we could not have been successful without lots of cooperation from your dad. I may never, ever again like your dad as a person, but he did step up as a parent in the years since our divorce. Again, I am thankful that your dad also wants what is best for YOU.
In those dark years, as I was still mourning the loss of my marriage and feeling sorry for myself, one day I looked up and you were well on your way to becoming a man. The night before you turned 15 and got your driver’s license was the first time I had cried in several years. I was sad that you were already old enough to drive. But what a relief it was when I didn’t have to drive to and from Bushland so much. Your driving was a tremendous help to me in parenting.
Where once there was a tall, skinny, carefree middle school student, now there was a tall, thin, thoughtful young man who was looking for approval. (And I probably didn’t voice that approval to you as often as I should have. Again, I apologize.) Yet, as much as I wanted you to stay my little boy a while longer, I knew your transition to an adult was inevitable. And you have rocked it, Carson.
Just think about the successes you have experienced as a student athlete in Bushland! We followed you to state in football. We followed you to state in baseball (twice). We followed you to the regional track meets in 2010 and 2011; we saw you become a Class Favorite and a homecoming king candidate, a Student Council rep; and now I see the spirited, full-filled socialite that you are today. We made so many awesome memories together during those “dark” years—the years that I thought I would dread. As it turned out, I was TOO BUSY to dread them! I couldn’t be prouder of who you’ve become during that time.
You graduated from high school, didn’t get immediately accepted into Tech, but you worked hard and got in due to your academic successes at WTAMU. You admitted while you were at WT that you liked college far more than you ever thought you would, and this made me sooooo happy….I KNOW you wanted to be at Tech for all of your college years, but your discipline and work ethic did get you there–just not as soon as you wanted. Maybe my expectations of you as a student were unrealistic and you thought I was too regimented about your college experience. I wanted success, and I don’t regret that I pushed you harder than you wanted to be pushed. And I know you grew tired of me staying on your ass about going to class, getting your assignments done, studying, finding part-time employment to supplement your social funds, spending too much money on beer and concerts, etc. But I also know that college years are likely to be the BEST years of your life, so I’m happy that you wanted to experience all of it. I HATED that you had to take Business Calculus II five times, but I don’t hate that you learned patience, discipline, and persistence in the process. All these things you learned while struggling with Business Calculus II will serve you well in the future (marriage, parenting, employment). Hell, Carson, I learned patience from you through your hard classes. And in the end, it may have been all the prayers we (me, my family, my Bushland friends) said that got you through it, but the fact remains that you DID get through it (and with a B)! And while I’m sad that you had to tolerate Marty for so many semesters, in the end, you passed his class, and you graduated, and neither of us off’ed Marty in the process. See? It was ALL worth it.
Now as you graduate from college, I’m looking forward to your future. I anticipate great things for you in your career, as a husband, and as a father. You’ve come too far to only come this far.
I wish for you employment success and relationship success. I want you to be financially comfortable. I wish for you a long and happy marriage when the time comes, and profound happiness as a husband and father. I hope you’ll become a man of faith, a man of commitment and discipline and awesome work ethic and family values.
Time has a wonderful way of showing me what really matters, and it doesn’t matter that I was a single, stressed-out, financially-strapped mom. Time has shown me that I’m probably happier as a single person than I could have possibly been married to your dad. (But it took me ten years to see it!) Time has shown me that you’re a success despite the bad experiences of your parents’ divorce. You refused to feel sorry for yourself. Again, I’m sorry it happened, but I’m thankful that your successes as a student and young man picked me up time and time again. Time flies, and my cup runneth over.
Thank you for being who you are. I couldn’t be prouder that you’re my son and that I’m your mom. I will always be your #1 fan.
Congratulations, and WRECK ‘EM.
Always,
Mom
The Prairie Purist 