Seeing Through the Cracks

Chapter 39

It's now mid-December and Jake is officially finished semester one of year two in Software Engineering.

Only five more semesters to go, I say to myself. One day at a time, one semester at a time, and eventually Jake will have his degree. And my hope is that as Jake reaches each semester's end, and he personally grows and matures, that managing this particular educational system will get a little easier for him.

I look back and see that for Jake, nursery school was a hardship, elementary school was an enormous struggle, and middle school must have felt tortuous and lonely, ending in an extensive illness. And then secondary school was a challenge, with Jake catching up on credits after a missed first year. But eventually, with much support, Jake persevered with education and somehow found unconventional ways to succeed. Perhaps it is during the struggle and the lowest points that Jake is able to fully expand his ability, and fight for what is necessary in reaching his goals. I hope his learning doesn't always have to come through struggle.

In the meantime, I am full of congratulations for Jake. I am elated to see this day and this moment, and so is my son. I tell him that because I am providing both emotional and financial assistance, I insist on seeing his final grades for this semester. He agrees and tells me that they will be available in about two weeks. Although I believe that Jake is being honest about the work he's completed, there's still that tiny piece of me that needs to see some tangible proof.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We celebrate a wonderful Christmas together. Our home is still not ready to return to, and so the insurance company provides us with more time in the hotel. By now, we have spent three months making this establishment our home away from home. I have Christmas cards hanging on the slats of the window blind, there's a Poinsettia on the desk beside a Christmas cookie tin that plays music. The gifts are all wrapped and there's food in the fridge in our little kitchenette to get us through the next few days. Nick and Jake share a comfortable room down the hall from us. Each of the hotel staff has made us feel welcome from day one, and they are aware that we will be celebrating the occasion alongside them. This setting is not ideal or traditional for Christmas celebrations, but we've learned to be adaptable and not waste a lot of energy on complaining. As we have done in the past, in a crisis we just improvise. It builds resilience and character in each one of us.

Nick arrives at the hotel Christmas Eve, mid-day, and we all get dressed up and attend an open house near our neighbourhood with friends, Derek and Lynn. Like so many of our friends, they have included us in some of their activities since we were evacuated from our home, and we're so grateful for their friendship. We have a couple of drinks; we eat, talk, laugh, and even play a game of billiards before we leave to go back to the hotel, wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas. We have a quick dinner in our hotel room and then we're off to see a movie playing at a cinema just out of town. When we return, Brian and I arrange our room and the gifts in a most festive manner, using a small table and the Poinsettia to make up for the fact that we don't have a Christmas tree. We're all adults, and we have no qualms about this. The space around us is not as important as the space we create between us, and being together is what matters most.

Christmas Day arrives and our plans to open gifts before breakfast are quickly adjusted when we realize we've slept in until 9:30 a.m. Breakfast service in the hotel ends at 10:00 a.m. We send a text to Nick and Jake asking them to meet us downstairs. Surprisingly, the breakfast bar is filled with couples and families also celebrating the holidays, so it feels a lot less isolating than I had anticipated. We are all strangers, and yet we are all kin to the meaning of Christmas, and everyone is in a good mood, making our morning meal feel quite festive.

Later, we exchange gifts, with which we all seem quite satisfied. We agree that a family gift we received from our good friends, Cindy and Glen, is our absolute favourite; it's a wooden carved game board for Dice Poker, complete with dice and poker chips. We spend an hour swimming in the hotel pool, and then we all get dressed for dinner. But before we leave to eat, we decide to try a few rounds of this new game. None of us can resist the opportunity to play, and it turns out to be loads of fun! It's difficult to leave this entertainment, but we have Christmas dinner reservations and have to pick up Brian's mom. So, off we drive to Etobicoke.

Mom is in a great mood, and so elated to see her family. At 101 years young, she's managing quite well living on her own, but her advanced age is affecting her cognitive functions. Today, she can't remember Nick's and Jake's names, or which one of them is still attending school, and which of them is living in the city and working. This lapse in her memory is a new development, and we are very aware that her health may be a little fragile, now. She's a bit wobbly on her feet, at first, and needs a cane to maneuver herself. We get her to the car, and then we're off to the Marriott Hotel for dinner. The restaurant is full and bustling with diners at the buffet. We make our way to our table, order drinks, and then we're all off to retrieve a feast of beef, lamb, turkey, and all the trimmings. I help mom with her meal and get her safely seated. We have a lovely time, and then we're back to mom's apartment to say good-bye for the night. Back at the hotel we all agree that more time needs to be made for playing Dice Poker, and a lot more laughter surfaces before we call it a night.

Boxing Day is spent playing and swimming, before I bring Nick back to the city. It's been a fabulous three days for all of us, and despite the fact that we didn't have a traditional Christmas in our home, we've had a holiday time that seemed more special than any other in years previous. Perhaps it's because of the togetherness required when in tight quarters, or a renewed appreciation for each other we've discovered through Brian's recent surgery, Jake's struggles with school, the flood and restoration ordeal, or all of it combined. Whatever it is, it's left a warm and bubbly feeling within each of us.

The following day is the best news day. I ask Jake if he thinks his final marks for semester one might be available. He replies with, "Let me go online and see right now."

We're both excited to see his results, and it's a fantastic feeling when they appear on his laptop's screen. He has passed all five credit courses! He has exceeded the grades he had anticipated getting in three of the courses. I am so happy for him, and so hugely relieved. He's done it, surpassing all expectations, and meeting all of the challenges.

"Congratulations Jake. Does this now give you confidence for the semesters to come?" I ask.

"No. What this actually means to me is that you finally have proof that I was doing the work that I said I was doing." Jake replies.

He continues "I knew how hard I was working, but dad always said that it would take some kind of written proof to erase the damage that had been done in my past, and now here it is."

For Jake it wasn't just a matter of working really hard and meeting the course requirements. He knew that no matter how diligent he was about school, there would always be doubt in our minds. There would always be a trust factor that we all had to get past, and he finally had evidence of his commitment. This kind of success could only happen as a result of Jake's deep desire to overcome his struggles, and work harder than ever to stay focused on school and on his personal goal of getting a degree. Our family could provide him all of the support he needed, but if staying in school was really not something that Jake wanted, then that deep chasm of frustration and apathy would be waiting to drag him down again.

I've often come to the understanding that school hasn't ever been a good fit for Jake. That didn't mean that I couldn't find a way to make it work somehow for him. University has been no exception. Year one and two were an absolute battle for Jake, and it required support from every possible direction to eventually pull him out from under himself. Monitoring closely, acting on my gut instincts, and insisting on exercising my parental authority and guidance, to ensure that Jake's adult education path continued with more ease was something I hadn't realized as a necessity until it was almost too late. Becoming eighteen is seen as such an important milestone in terms of growing up, and Jake's outward expression of wanting to be independent and "grown-up" threw a wrench into the mix. I let go way too soon. In my attempt to transition from parenting my child to parenting my adult child in a way that I believed would please Jake, I nearly lost him. Today, I celebrate not only Jake's success with his first semester, but also his ability to get honest with himself, with his journey to overcome his own internal battles, and his desire to grow into the man he wishes to be. There is room for trust again.