After meeting my kids' mom and we first got together she gifted me with two young stepsons ages 4 and 2. We got married and then within the next 3 years she gifted me with two beautiful daughters of my own. Life couldn't be better and I felt as though I would burst with the daily happiness and joy I felt.

When their mom and I divorced I feared that happiness was over but as the kids chose to live with me primarily... not for lack of love for their mother but they were always closer to me... I got to spend more quality time with the kids. While I missed being a family unit all together, since my time with the kids was 100% on my terms it was even better.

I knew that it's normal that they would grow up and leave the nest. You want them to for their own happiness. For this reason I made it a point to soak up every moment... every memory. We had fun. 16 years as a single parent with 4, then 3, then 2, then 1, and soon none in my house.

Once a bustling house full of activity. Arguments, rough housing, music and TVs too loud in the other rooms, laughter, hugs, ball games, movies, parades, sleep overs, picking them up at the skating rink or bowling alley. Now no one will ever be coming home later. I will get up in the mornings and shower to head to work in silence. I will go to work where the younger co-workers don't relate to the old guy and we only talk for a few minutes a day, then I will come home to silence, and I will know that no one will be coming home. Then tomorrow I will do it all again. 

In my mind I will see the toddlers running in the yard, I will see them on the swings as I push them, I will remember their getting up in the middle of the night and getting up on my lap in the recliner to rock them to sleep, I will see them marching in the band, or in the color guard. I will remember the long conversations as we walked and going down the water slide with them at the city pool. And I'll text them... and I'll call. But no one is ever coming home later. 

So much joy eventually replaced by sadness, loneliness, and a longing for the days gone by. It's like the more joy you got to experience as they were young, the more pain you feel as they leave. Don't get me wrong... I am proud of them and I am excited for them as they head out on their own in the world. But I always felt some comfort in knowing that later someone would be coming home... and now the only one left to come home will already be here.. alone.