Jostling

Just when the horses outside have started to settle a bit, with a lot less teeth and hooves being used, inside the house, my herd of children are finding it necessary to jostle about a bit due to TM leaving.

The first time I experienced this was when my older children first started to be involved in theater and were gone all day every day for tech week before a show. For a week, it was just me and the youngest doing our thing with the oldest being gone. I was caught totally off guard for how much jostling needed to happen upon their return each day as family dynamics changes to make room. I found it eye opening as we hadn't ever experienced something like that before. While various children would be gone for an hour or two here and there for classes and play dates, it wasn't the whole day for multiple days in a row. That caused the younger people at home to create a new dynamic among themselves which didn't always allow for the older children. The older children assumed that their role would be held for them while they were gone. They were not teeth or feet involved, but there were certainly words and body language. 

Then, the ante is increased when a child leaves for college and is gone for months at a time. There is the readjustment to fill in for the missing person, but then life continues. The children at home grow and develop and increase in abilities often because they don't have that older person to step in for them. That's all great... until that older child returns home. The returning child often forgets that the younger brothers and sisters have continued to grow and mature, and assumes that they will step into their previous role. This is not always desired by the younger siblings who have come to like their new, more mature roles in the family, so there is more jostling.

TM did a lot with the younger half, especially this last year. He was always up for taking someone somewhere... dollar store, library, park, out for ice cream. TM was kind of a really cool camp counselor who always had an activity planned. And now the camp counselor with all the plans (and the car keys) isn't here. There has been some significant moaning about wanting to do something or go somewhere. Everyone will figure out how to fill their days and how to plan ahead for getting someone to take them where they want to go, but it isn't going to be quite the same as having a brother who is willing to go at the drop of a hat. 

So there has been jostling and figuring out who is going to be doing what and how to manage their own fun. They'll get there, but we have to work through the big feelings first, both acknowledged and unacknowledged (we are talking about middle and early high schoolers here after all), which causes some tempers to be short and irritation high. 

In some ways, maybe the teeth and hooves are easier...