Holding onto our kids, and letting them go

Also: Language is my blood [Donate ❤️]( [View in Browser](  October 1, 2023 Dear Cog reader, In late August, I joined the herd of parents embarking on a hallowed and traumatic tradition: driving a car packed with mini-fridges, extra-long twin sheets and wide-eyed college freshmen to an unfamiliar place. You will leave your child here, in a tiny room with another teenager you have both just met, and hope these two strangers will like each other, or at least share circadian rhythms. You’ll hug your son goodbye — hug him hard — and hope you’ll see him before Thanksgiving break. I’m excited to hear about my son’s new life at college — about the friends he’s making and the clubs he’s joining. It’s eternally gratifying to watch him grow into his life. I’m hopeful for him — and for the future — as I see him convert his passion for wildlife and photography into college studies and a career. But I miss him deeply. I’d long dreaded this fall, the day his bedroom would transform into an empty room. I’m grieving the end of this stretch of parenting. There are many kinds of grief, and this isn’t the worst kind to have; I still get to be part of his life. He’ll come home. Although, as Lucy Kaplansky wrote in the song “[Last Days of Summer]( after her daughter went to college, “I know she’ll come back but never always again.” So when I read [Oona Metz’s essay]( about the simultaneous hope and dread of parenting kids, I knew exactly what she meant. “Even though I’ve done this before, I'm relearning the delicate dance of simultaneously holding on and letting go,” Oona writes. “I remind myself that I've faced different versions of this dance — helping my daughter learn to walk, sending her to kindergarten, dropping her off at summer camp for the first time." I've had more time for reading in my quieter house. Right now, I’m deep into Robin Wall Kimmerer’s “[Braiding Sweetgrass]( In it, Kimmerer writes eloquently about the agony of taking her older daughter to college, even though she knew from the first time she held her baby that “all her growing would be away from me.” “We are showered every day with gifts, but they are not meant for us to keep,” Kimmerer writes. “Their life is in their movement, their inhale and exhale of our shared breath. Our work and our joy is to pass along the gift and to trust that what we put out into the universe will always come back.” Thanks for reading. P.S.— At Cog, it’s our role to bring you commentaries that are deeply personal and add perspective and depth to the news. We can do that thanks to the generous and voluntary support of our members. Please [join them]( To keep our voice strong, WBUR needs 2,500 new monthly contributors by Thursday. Your gift of $10 or $12 a month will make a meaningful difference to you and everyone who values Cognoscenti. Please [give monthly today](. Kathleen Burge Editor [Follow]( Support the news   Must Reads ['Language is blood; language is family’ — even if I’m losing my Spanish]( I know my Spanish grammar is in tatters and my fluency is slipping by the day, writes Judy Bolton-Fasman. Yet I remain fiercely Latinx. [Read more.]( ['Language is blood; language is family’ — even if I’m losing my Spanish]( I know my Spanish grammar is in tatters and my fluency is slipping by the day, writes Judy Bolton-Fasman. Yet I remain fiercely Latinx. [Read more.]( [Parenting teens is a dance of hope and dread]( A recent high school prank reminded writer Oona Metz about the emotional complexity of both holding onto our children and letting them go. [Read more.]( [Parenting teens is a dance of hope and dread]( A recent high school prank reminded writer Oona Metz about the emotional complexity of both holding onto our children and letting them go. [Read more.]( [New laws threaten educators who teach history. Where does that leave our democracy?]( Universal public education should prepare American children for democratic citizenship, writes Kaylene Stevens. But new laws in states across the country may prevent educators from teaching about history, civic responsibility and current events. [Read more.]( [New laws threaten educators who teach history. Where does that leave our democracy?]( Universal public education should prepare American children for democratic citizenship, writes Kaylene Stevens. But new laws in states across the country may prevent educators from teaching about history, civic responsibility and current events. [Read more.]( [When we pay attention, empathy is everywhere]( When Jonathan D. Fitzgerald set out to research and write about empathy, he started to see it everywhere. It led him to wonder, is empathy like a muscle you can strengthen, or is it more like rhythm — you either have it or you don’t? [Read more.]( [When we pay attention, empathy is everywhere]( When Jonathan D. Fitzgerald set out to research and write about empathy, he started to see it everywhere. It led him to wonder, is empathy like a muscle you can strengthen, or is it more like rhythm — you either have it or you don’t? [Read more.]( [To support a 'beautiful resistance' I faced questions about my own responsibility]( Over the last year, Leah Hager Cohen has attended weekly Zoom seminars about Israel and Palestine. After a recent seminar, she was compelled to make a donation to a Palestinian arts organization, only to have her transaction held up. What she learned next made her think more deeply about individual responsibility in a free society. [Read more.]( [To support a 'beautiful resistance' I faced questions about my own responsibility]( Over the last year, Leah Hager Cohen has attended weekly Zoom seminars about Israel and Palestine. After a recent seminar, she was compelled to make a donation to a Palestinian arts organization, only to have her transaction held up. What she learned next made her think more deeply about individual responsibility in a free society. [Read more.]( What We're Reading "We are a lifeline for populations that have slipped through the spaces in a weakening social safety net; we are a target for organized harassment and censorship campaigns." "[Librarians on the Front Lines: A Reading List for Library Lovers and Realists]( Longreads. "I’d spent so much time pushing my family’s history aside, and now here it was, circling back at me." "[I Never Called Her Momma]( The Atlantic. "The perilous conditions in residential schools are in part the product of a complex bureaucracy that places few restrictions on who cares for students with challenging disabilities that include not only autism but mental health diagnoses, aggressive behavior, and trauma." "[There are no words]( The Boston Globe. "Can one become more (or less) empathetic, or is empathy like rhythm — you either have it or you don’t?" — Jonathan D. Fitzgerald, "[When we pay attention, empathy is everywhere]( ICYMI [We were together in the twilight of his life. And that was enough]( Geri Denterlein's husband Jack Thomas spent his final days much the same way he spent most days in their 34-year relationship: reading, writing, collecting recipes, gardening and planning ahead. "It was my life that changed," Geri writes. [Read more.]( [We were together in the twilight of his life. And that was enough]( Geri Denterlein's husband Jack Thomas spent his final days much the same way he spent most days in their 34-year relationship: reading, writing, collecting recipes, gardening and planning ahead. "It was my life that changed," Geri writes. [Read more.]( If you’d like to write for Cognoscenti, send your submission, pasted into your email and not as an attachment, to opinion@wbur.org. 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