{"id":3665,"date":"2015-06-07T05:00:39","date_gmt":"2015-06-07T12:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/?p=3665"},"modified":"2015-06-06T13:03:32","modified_gmt":"2015-06-06T20:03:32","slug":"turning-points","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/culture\/turning-points\/","title":{"rendered":"TURNING POINTS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"graduation\"<\/a>On the last day of May my grandson graduated from high school. It was a majestic ceremony. The graduates, following a 112-year-old tradition, wore tuxedos and long white gowns. Each of the girls carried eighteen red roses. The choir sang, speeches were given, and diplomas were presented to all 102 graduates.<\/p>\n

My grandson, being a good and conscientious student who never would have entertained the thought of dropping out of high school, didn\u2019t specifically choose this turning point in his life. It just happened. He reached the end of twelfth grade and then one day, after the long and boring graduation practice, he found himself marching up the aisle to Pomp and Circumstance.<\/p>\n

In a couple of months, he will leave his parents\u2019 house for college. And though he\u2019ll come home for holidays, it will never be the same. With this graduation, he has started down the path to independence.<\/p>\n

I tend to think of turning points as a change in direction consciously chosen. Robert Frost\u2019s poem, so often heard, has planted an indelible picture in my brain of a man reaching a fork in the road and making his choice.<\/p>\n

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I\u2014
\nI took the one less traveled by,
\nAnd that has made all the difference.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The choices we make for ourselves do loom large. But when you think about it, many turning points are thrust upon us.<\/p>\n

My grandson is the second of two children, so his graduation initiated a turning point for his parents. Soon they will enter a new stage of life: the era of the empty nest.<\/p>\n

It seems that even if you don\u2019t turn the steering wheel, you may find yourself on another road. It happens to all parents. They give birth to their children, teach them, watch them grow, and\u2014before they know it\u2014the children are all grown up and preparing to fly away.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The Monon Center, a good place to walk<\/p><\/div>\n

My daughter shed her share of tears when her first child, my granddaughter, left for college. I’m guessing she\u2019s just as reluctant to let her last child go. It\u2019s the walks that give her away. Even though she belongs to a terrific gym, this past year her favorite form of exercise has been taking long walks with her son.<\/p>\n

If I hadn\u2019t experienced how painful it was to send a child away to college, I might have been surprised. After all, isn\u2019t this what she wants for her son: to grow up and go to college? It\u2019s not as though she\u2019ll never see him again.<\/p>\n

\"ducklings,<\/a>

ducklings, not yet ready to fly away<\/p><\/div>\n

But I remember clearly how heart-wrenching it was to send each of my daughters off to college. For eighteen years that child was part of my life \u2026 every single day. And then she\u2019s gone. For months afterwards, I thought I saw her everywhere, her dark hair swinging, her stride almost right \u2026 for a moment, until it wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Graduations are only one kind of turning point. Challenges and changes never end. A few days ago I said good-bye to my chiropractor and his wife\/receptionist, two people I\u2019ve come to love (and not just for the sake of my spine). They\u2019re packing up and leaving the city, moving to a small town on the Columbia River so they can be near their daughter. It\u2019s an enormous turning point for them, but it\u2019s a change they\u2019ve chosen for themselves.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know if the choosing makes much difference though. What do you think?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the last day of May my grandson graduated from high school. It was a majestic ceremony. The graduates, following a 112-year-old tradition, wore tuxedos and long white gowns. Each of the girls carried eighteen red roses. The choir sang, speeches were given, and diplomas were presented to all 102 graduates. My grandson, being a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,155,177],"tags":[812,811,809,805,813,808,807,810,806],"class_list":["post-3665","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-family","category-parenting","tag-children-grow-up-and-leave-home","tag-choices-we-make","tag-empty-nest","tag-high-school-graduation","tag-moving-to-be-near-children","tag-pomp-and-circumstance","tag-robert-frost-the-road-not-taken","tag-sending-child-off-to-college","tag-turning-points"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3Kn1e-X7","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7713,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/family\/graduations-meaningful-ceremonies-or-no-big-deal\/","url_meta":{"origin":3665,"position":0},"title":"Graduations–Meaningful Ceremonies or No Big Deal?","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"May 26, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"When our son-in-law finished his doctorate, my husband and I packed our bags and prepared to fly down to Berkeley to attend the graduation ceremony. D would be the first person I knew (excluding medical doctors) to earn a doctorate. To me, it seemed like a big deal. D didn't\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "family"","block_context":{"text":"family","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/family\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Princeton-graduation-R-001-e1558551186910.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2505,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/family\/first-day-of-school-jitters\/","url_meta":{"origin":3665,"position":1},"title":"First-Day-of-School Jitters","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"September 7, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I click the attachments on my daughter\u2019s e-mail, and there he is: my six-year-old grandson looking jaunty in his knee-length red pants and green sweatshirt, a backpack slung over his shoulders. He lives across the country from me, in Maryland, and this is his first day of school. He stands\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "family"","block_context":{"text":"family","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/family\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Children_about_to_board_the_school_bus_(Thibodaux,_Louisiana), wikimedia","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Children_about_to_board_the_school_bus_Thibodaux_Louisiana-wikimedia.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Children_about_to_board_the_school_bus_Thibodaux_Louisiana-wikimedia.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Children_about_to_board_the_school_bus_Thibodaux_Louisiana-wikimedia.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":6117,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/family\/graduation-2017-and-my-granddaughter\/","url_meta":{"origin":3665,"position":2},"title":"Graduation 2017 and my Granddaughter","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"June 11, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"A Completion and a Beginning. Most of life is just day after day\u2014the rising and setting of the sun, the turning of the seasons. One day blending into another. But then, there are the milestones, those events that mark a new phase in one\u2019s life: the birth of a child,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "family"","block_context":{"text":"family","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/category\/family\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/IMG_2468-e1496955957544.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7889,"url":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/seasons\/summer-fading\/","url_meta":{"origin":3665,"position":3},"title":"Summer Fading","author":"Nicki Chen","date":"September 8, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"It's not fall yet, but summer is fading fast. There are signs of it everywhere. 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