Scout is moving out today—to a high rise apartment, downtown, near her grad school and the restaurant where she’s working.
It feels terrible, taking her across town and depositing her, with a few clothes and provisions, in a small room away from us. It feels worse than taking her to college.
In a daily meditation, I must remind myself why she can’t just stay here, with us.
That meditation will be much speeded along by a reading I just heard, by the writer Carl Hiaasen, of a 1958 column by Ernie Lyons, about the St. Lucie River. He mentions the pines along the river bank, whose seeds spiral down “on their little wings, to find a starting place away from the deadly shade of their parents.”
And also, I keep in mind a bike ride with five-year-old Scout:
“Dad, do you have words you like?”
“Mellifluous. And scout.”
“Is scout a word?”
“Yep.”
“What does it mean?”
“A scout is someone who goes ahead of the group and sees what’s up there and comes back and tells everyone what to expect.”
“Why did you name me that?”
“I guess because that’s the kind of person I hope you’ll be.”
“Oh no, Dad!“
“What?”
“I’ll get lost!”
“No you won’t. You don’t have to go up ahead until you’re ready.”
“I don’t?”
“Besides, you’re already a scout. You’re already going ahead—you’re going to school without us, you’re going places in your mind that we don’t go, you’re riding your bike ahead of me all the time.”
“You’re right, Dad. I am.”
“Yes, honey, you are.”
Godspeed, Babe.
***
Postscript: This was what she woke up to on this first morning of the rest of her life.
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