A Mother's Day essay

What I Learned Her Freshman Year

By Jill Kuraitis, 5-15-07

Last fall we sent our youngest baby off to university and I cried for a week.

This weekend I traveled to her, just a month before year’s end, observed her in her college habitat, and cried again. But this time it wasn’t about losing her.

Daughter is a serious scholar and a funny, sunny girl with a wordsmith’s wit and the observation skills of a Special Forces agent.  And since universities are like fields of words and ideas and experiments blooming like dandelions, she’s in that thrilling time of life when there’s so much to consider that her beautiful head is spinning.

She is the wild roses that scramble up a riverside tree, grabbing onto something – anything – to be able to look down and choose which bright dandelions to grab before they turn to fluff and blow away.

Everything is interesting to her; everything catches her eye and ear; she can’t possibly choose between marine science or politics or classic literature or dance or philosophy. She loves the city where she lives; she loves that the squirrels are grey instead of the reds of Boise; she knows the names of all the trees and flowers we don’t see in Idaho. She carries duck snacks in her pockets on the way to class. 

When she was nine months old, she said her first word - “duck” - and spent hours of her childhood feeding them. Once she brought a fluffy yellow ducky home and hand-raised him. He imprinted on her and waddled hurriedly behind her, his goofy little wings useless as he wobbled and stumbled.

I felt like that little duck, following her without question, watching the pretty back of her neck adoringly while she competently showed me her campus and her new life.

She chattered about her professors and what books they’ve given her. She explained two opposing life philosophies to me in great detail and with examples and I understood the concepts for the first time. She described an oceanography project which has gripped her attention and a literature professor she loves who has her writing 1,000 words a week. She told me about the classes she’ll need to get into law school, unless she becomes a choreographer, a marine biologist, a social worker, a psychologist or a philospher instead.

She showed me all the locations and cubbyholes where she likes to study. She’s on the Dean’s List, but feels she could do better. I don’t see how.

She was sick in bed for Mother’s Day, and spent the afternoon calling all her friends to remind them to call their mothers.

She held onto me and kissed me in front of her dorm friends and dragged me from room to room for introductions. My heart seized up with love when I realized she was introducing me to them, not them to me.  Everyone had something to say to her – thanks for picking up my sweater; Brad wants you to pick out a tie to go with his black shirt; will you please find out why my computer is wacky; what was the name of that philosophy book you mentioned?  There was something motherly about her to which they were clearly attached.

She went off for a shower while I sat with her friends.  I asked about the mother thing, and they looked at each other and busted up. “She’s the mother of the whole floor.” “She organizes everything and kicks our butts out the door.” “She coached me for a job interview and I got the job.” “If you don’t recycle every scrap of everything she will get you out of bed to do it.” “She makes me write thank-you notes.” “She’s got us set up like a family.” “My dad wants me to marry her.”

They described an incident when two of the boys climbed a three-story high tree outside the dorm and used a cell phone to call her cell phone to come out and take pictures of them. When she got there, she was so horrified at how high they’d climbed that she refused to take pictures. Instead, she stood below with her hands on her hips, yelling, “YOU DAMN BOYS! YOU COME DOWN FROM THERE!  YOU’RE SCARING ME AND I AM GOING TO CRY!” The boys said they laughed so hard they nearly did fall out of the tree.

Was all that motherliness, um, annoying, I wondered? The room erupted.  “OH, NO NO NO NOOOOO!  It’s hilarious! We love her to pieces! She rocks!”

Then, with a serious face, a boy said, “She taught me how to study.” What did she teach you? I asked.  Boy said: “She told me to quit whining and just do it.”

It was a perfect description of Daughter’s character.  She believes in action.

I don’t always know what I believe, but I know one thing for sure: my baby duck has her wing feathers now, and I believe in HER.

Like this story? Get more! Sign up for our free newsletters.