Well, today we packed up Stephanie and took her back to college. Unlike when she left in August, this time it took her only about a half-hour to pack. She was like a well-oiled machine, hoovering up all all the cosmetics on the bathroom counter, scooping up her DVDs and CDs and Christmas presents, folding her laundry and putting it in the four designated suitcases. Before I even knew it, everything was piled in the car, and people were saying things to me like, “Okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!”

It was as smooth a move as you’re ever going to see. Traffic was light, parking was easy, the dorms weren’t crowded yet. We set her stuff down in her room (which did have kind of an untended, closed-up smell still) and went to have salads and sandwiches at Cosi around the corner, where we met Allie, too, before she headed off to her prenatal yoga class. She showed us adorable ultrasound pictures of her baby, who was caught on camera grabbing his toes and then releasing them.

And then…well, you always get to this moment, when there doesn’t seem to be anything else to do or say, and so you have to go back home.

I will say this: it’s easier to say goodbye outside on a drizzly January day when you’ve done it before, than it is when you’re sweltering in August, and you’ve just come from orientation meetings where the dean of students is saying, “…and we’re going to take care of your kids…we know you’re sad, but it’s going to be all right…” and exhausted parents all around you are blubbering and blowing their noses, and you realize that the loudest honking noises are coming from YOU.   

I’m fine. We got home to a house that was astonishingly silent–but familiar in its silence, too. The dog, who had given me a sad, accusing look as we had loaded the car with suitcases this morning, seemed just glad to see that at least two of us had returned in time to feed him his dinner. He did glance into Stephanie’s bedroom just to see if he’d missed munching on her any of her old Kleenex tissues–but I think he’s resigned to the fact that it’s just two of us and him for another long while.

I’m going to get back to my novel-writing schedule. The days will get longer, the pages will get written…and the spring will bring Stephanie back, as well as not one, but TWO new babies for the family. (Ben and his wife Amy are also expecting a new baby boy; his ultrasound picture greets me on the refrigerator each morning when I reach for the carton of milk.)

And oh, yes, spring will also bring a completed novel.

Yikes. We all have a lot of creating to do between now and then.