Empty Nest? What Empty Nest?

My wife and I did our best to raise our daughter to be smart and responsible, so when she decided to move out a few months ago, we were pretty sure she’d be fine.

Only a couple of weeks went by and we were almost ashamed to enjoy the “empty nest”. But, being the troopers we are, we did our best.

At the same time, my mother, who turned seventy about two months ago, told me she was having trouble taking care of the home she rented. I can understand that, because it was a three bedroom, two bath house – much too big for a single woman to keep up with. I spoke to my wife, and we came up with a solution – move my mother into our daughter’s old room.

Before you think we’ve totally lost our minds, hear me out – Mom would always spend her weekends with us, even though we were less than 10 miles away. But she was lonely, and we loved the company. Our weekends tended to be filled with cooking, shopping and laughing – mostly laughing. So it really wasn’t much of a stretch to bring mom here.

So now, it’s several months later, and there’s been no blood spilled, and no threats to anyone’s life. Believe it or not, we enjoy having our new “roomie” with us – we watch a lot of the same television shows and movies, And, it didn’t take much work to add Mom’s desk to our office space.

Our weekends are much more relaxed – we’ll usually cook breakfast together, visit at the table, then retire to the office to play video games.

In other words, not much has changed. We just put a lot less miles on our vehicles, and get to spend Saturdays in our jammies 🙂

As for our daughter, she seems happy and well-adjusted. Other than the panicked calls asking where gnats come from (not her salad, that’s for sure), and the occasional “I have a cold, what should I take,” question, she’s doing great. And when she comes to visit, we actually spend more quality time with her than we did when she lived here. Everyone wins.

Of course, I haven’t even gone into the “pack” situation – with Mom’s chiweenie, we now have four dogs under twenty pounds. I’ll leave their adventures for another day.