My beautiful baby girl was turning 18 in the middle of November. She was an adult!  I would normally put a lot of time and effort into making such an auspicious occasion special and memorable.  We would have planned a very large celebration, something everyone was excited about, but unfortunately Alex’s birthday got short shrift.

Alex and my brother Casper had the same birthday which meant that we joined them together for celebration.  For years, we had a tradition of going out to dinner as a large group: my parents, my family, and Casper’s family.  Since my parents would pay for the celebration, Alex and Casper took advantage of the single celebration to choose a fine restaurant. Fine, as in Michelin-star-rated fine.  Alex and Casper researched, debated, and selected the restaurant with care. It was something they enjoyed doing together.

This year, Alex said she didn’t want to have the usual celebration. I don’t feel like I ever got a clear reason why, but I thought maybe Wayne used his persuasion and charm to convince Alex that I wasn’t up to a big night out.  I accepted that we didn’t need to celebrate with a large family gathering, but this was my baby’s entrance into adulthood. That needed a defining event or moment, at least.  So I asked her to choose a restaurant and we’d go out, the three of us, on the day of her birthday. Ben was away at school and wouldn’t be home until the day before Thanksgiving.  We would celebrate again with Ben when he was in town, the four of us. I wanted the day of Alex’s birth to be special, like we did when Ben turned 18, but it didn’t happen.

One tradition I had started with Ben, was to buy him a suit when he turned 18. The kids were now adults, they would attend adult functions, they would be attending college, maybe going on interviews, and I wanted to make that large purchase for them.  I wanted the kids to have a very nice suit that would last them for years to come.  When Ben turned 18, Wayne and I took him shopping for his suit.  This was a gift of love, a recognition of Ben as an adult, a preparation for his future life and time spent alone with our son.  We enjoyed this rite of passage for Ben into adulthood.

Seeking to continue the suit tradition for Alex, I mentioned the outing to Wayne.  He refused to go.  He had no interest.   I wondered if this was a guy thing. Like maybe Wayne didn’t want to be trapped with a daughter at the mall, but shopping with a son was ok.  I know it wasn’t that Wayne didn’t want to spend time with Alex, because they did spend time together without me. They had spent quite a bit of time working on the GTO they were restoring in the garage.  So that left me.  Maybe it was about me.  I could imagine that Wayne was trying to avoid me, but I really hoped he could be an adult and get over his issues while we supported Alex.  This may have been a tradition I had established, and we had enjoyed with some fanfare for Ben, so I didn’t want Alex treated differently.  I was determined that she would have the same benefits as Ben.  It was unfair of Wayne to do this and wrong. In the end, I took Alex shopping alone, and we had a good time, but I wondered if she felt short-changed.  Being the only child living at home, she was taking the brunt of our distance and probably felt she was stuck in the middle. She probably felt like some divorced kids do, even though she was an adult.

On Alex’s birthday I made cupcakes and left a gift at the house while she was at school.  I left a note regarding dinner plans.  Alex hadn’t finalized a dinner plan so I informed her that the three of us could go out, or we could include my parents.  Alex called me after she got home saying she wanted to do dinner on a different day, when Ben came into town. I tried to talk her around, but in the end I accepted her postponement.  It would be more fun with the four of us. But I was still really sad and depressed about her birthday.  It was nothing that she deserved and nothing that I had envisioned.  Our family was in crisis over my health situation yet I felt that instead of joining together to work to resolve issues and fight a battle together, that my family was slowly unraveling and the strings holding everything together were becoming looser by the day.  I was struggling to keep everything from fully unraveling.

I was still disappointed that we were breaking tradition of a dinner celebration on the night of her actual birthday.  I was even more disappointed that her birthday was turning into a non-event. And this was a big birthday. Looking back I’m sure Alex felt in the “middle”.  Wayne was probably distancing himself and probably opted out of her birthday celebration, assuming my parents would come. Maybe he wasn’t comfortable seeing me or seeing me crazy, or didn’t want me to go crazy in a restaurant.  I think Wayne loved each of his children equally, so I was upset that he was treating them differently.  I felt bad for Alex, for she was sure to notice.  As parents, we needed to join together to make something special for Alex, but instead we were pulling farther apart.  Poor Alex was probably feeling she had to pick sides or balance the two of us.  This was her senior year of high school and the last thing she should be worried about is her parents.

Unfortunately, with Ben’s schedule, travel time, and other commitments, it became too difficult to schedule a dinner with the four of us.  With Thanksgiving so close and Ben coming home, we resolved we’d just celebrate it then.  First her birthday dinner was a fail, now we have to move the date again.  So her fabulous 18^th birthday celebration was a dud.

On the night of her birthday, I was able to spend some time with Alex. She did find time for me in her busy schedule.  She said she would come visit me as soon as she showered.

Shortly I heard the truck pull up in front of the house and noticed it was almost dark when she arrived.  It then took her 10-15 minutes to get to the door.  I didn’t think much of that as she was familiar with all the neighbors and it wasn’t unlikely that someone stopped to chat.  Or she was sitting in the truck, texting on her phone.

When she came in the house, she looked as white as a ghost. She looked shaken. I could see something was wrong.

“What’s wrong?” I ask her.

She tells me, “When I drove up, I pulled up to the curb and got out of the truck. I heard someone saying ‘Help me. Help me.’ The old man next door was on the ground.  I had to help him up.  He was all bloody, so I helped him to his house.  His son was just coming home and started questioning me about what happened.”

“How did the neighbor get bloody? Is he okay?” I asked.

“Mom, the whole thing just freaked me out.  I don’t know what happened. I just found the guy on the ground,” she said.

“Do you want me to go talk to them?” I asked.

“No. Don’t talk to them. It’s fine.” she said.

She stayed for a while and we chatted.  When she got back home, she must have told Wayne what happened, because he called me.

Wayne said, “Did Alex tell you what happened?”

I said, “Yes, and I think she handled it well.”

“What are you going to do about this?” Wayne says to me.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“Did she really tell you about it?  What really happened to that man?  I’m worried about them”, he says. “You have to deal with this.”

I said, “I suggest we let Alex have her birthday and I’ll take care of it later.”

“It’s really bothering me.” He says.

It seemed like Wayne assumed that Alex hit the neighbor with her truck.  I don’t know why he assumed that Alex would run someone down.  He could have misinterpreted Alex if she said she

parked and found a guy on the ground in front of her truck.  But he could have asked some questions to find out.

I think Wayne wanted me to talk to the neighbor to be sure we didn’t get sued, or something like that. I told him I’d take care of it and that everything would be fine.  Wayne needing me to “take care of it” was not surprising.  I was the “fixer” in the family.  Even “thought-blocked” as he told people I was, he was still looking to me to resolve issues.

When I visited the neighbor the next day, he had a contusion on his head. He’d had a cat scan and they were treating him for concussion. He said he tripped while getting his mail and fell into the street.  He was glad that Alex had been there to help him since it was dark and he wasn’t sure how long he’d been there.  My reaction? Pride in Alex. Wayne’s reaction? Suspicion.

I continued to worry about Alex, now an adult, but whose parents were drifting apart and not focused on getting her prepared for the next stage of her life.  She didn’t deserve for all this to hit her alone, the only child at home.  She was managing well, but I felt there would be longer lasting issues for her living alone with her father who was becoming more intent on living his own life as an empty nester.  He seemed to have determined that now an adult, she needed little more from him.  Her final year of high school should have been a special time for us as a family, enjoying the special senior events, but instead she probably felt in the middle, trying to navigate her parents who weren’t united on any front.  As well, the fact that Wayne wanted to avoid me at times meant that she had to consider her parents relationship every time she wanted something from one or both of us.  It was an exciting but tough time for her.

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash

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