Almost the end

For four years now, I have left work, hopped in my car, and drove five whole minutes to the daycare to pick up my son. For four years, it's been my favourite part of the day. When he was a toddler, he'd run over to me, covered in smiles, shouting my name. (sometimes my actual name, because he had sussed out that everyone had a mama, and no one else had a myname.)

I went to years and years of parent meetings and daycare potlucks. I emptied and filled cubbies and water bottles, enjoyed and endured small talk with other parents (mostly the former, thankfully!). We went from one centre to another, talked about friends and friend mishaps and joys and sorrows. I've picked him up happy and found him, once, on the couch sobbing "mama! mama!" which nearly broke my heart. The caregivers and teachers became friends, and in some circumstances were a lifeline, a resource, when I needed to talk and figure out this thing called parenting. It's been an amazing experience, because the daycare was such a great place for him: the most amazing part has been watching my shy, unsure, book-loving toddler morph into a confident, happy, outgoing boy.

Today I am home baking cupcakes. For his goodbye day. Tomorrow is his last day, and next week he starts kindergarten orientation.

Truth be told he's still going to almost the same place. He's going to the private kindergarten offered by the same organization, which means I will still pick him up five minutes from my office, around the same culdesac. I will drive by his old daycare twice a day, every day.

But it still feels like a huge freaking deal. And I am feeling sad, like I am losing something, like something is being left behind. A milestone reached, and overcome, and passed into memory.

And yet at the same time, I am kind of excited -- he's my first born, my first baby, and he's grown and changed so much from the big fat baby into a long lanky boy with messy hair and his first loose tooth. He still has the same big brown eyes, and now he talks non-stop, with new ideas and things he thinks are funny, and I just can't wait to see what my wonderful 5-and-a-half year old will do next.

You know, besides singing me a song about doo-doo, and laughing uproariously.