August 26, 2006
In the month of August of every year, college-bound students pack their myriad of belongings and leave home.
For the freshman, it is often their first time away.
You can spot them easily that initial day on campus.
They are the ones who flee as far away as possible from their embarrassing Baby Boomer parents.
For others, upper classman or career students, college move-in day is “old hat.”
Mom and Dad do not mortify them quite so much anymore.
Sophomores to seniors know that parents are good for a few necessities, notably food, cash, and gasoline for starters. It takes the Frosh a bit longer to figure this out.
Upper classmen actually enjoy their parents better than they did when they were freshman. We cannot assume, however, that means parents are to stay any longer on move-in day than to unload, fix things, and provide food.
Upperclassmen are ready to be taken out to lunch immediately after they dump their possessions on the floor of their rooms.
Cash is the priority now. Skip the décor.
Freshman just want their parents to leave.
That fact, however, does not mean that all parents will leave. Some have been known to stay in a motel for a couple of weeks just to make sure their students are adjusting well and that all needs are met.
As a veteran of I-don’t-know-how-many college move-in days, I do not recommend that parents hang around very long.
It could get very weird.
Whatever you do if you are the parent of a fraternity guy, do not go upstairs in any fraternity house until Family Weekend!
After the freshman year has passed, parents of a sophomore may notice that their student does not need to spruce the new place up much. No one appears to care any longer if the bedspreads match or if there is a comfy rug on the floor.
Designer room décor will come back into the picture later when students move into apartments during their junior and senior years and beyond. Be ready then to visit a lot of furniture stores or garage sales.
And, as the unlucky of us know, some students do stay on into the “beyond” years.
One thing we parents learn through “the school of hard knocks” is that college move-in day is both physically and emotionally exhausting.
It does not matter if it is the first year or the fifth or even the eighth for some.
Oh, my.
By the way, I do not believe any parent who tells me they enjoy driving for hours to the chosen college in an overstuffed car full of boxes, shoes, and cleaning supplies.
Neither do parents thrill at the idea of pulling a U-Haul trailer crammed full of their student’s belongings only to have to unload in the rain and lug small refrigerators and microwaves to the third floor.
Whenever other students appear on the scene, be warned. Parents will be shunned from that moment on and become invisible to their student but not unnecessary.
Dads can be seen on college move-in day carrying their DeWalt power tool cases into the dorm rooms while Moms are making at least three Wal-Mart runs for more extension chords and curtain rods.
Why do parents gladly put themselves into slave labor mode year after year on college move-in days?
I am guessing it is because we are completely lost in this strange new way of life.
Simply put, we are lost at the prospect of living without our kids.
One way for parents to hold it together for a little while is to clean a room, drill holes, install closet organizers, and assemble a bed frame.
It helps.
Kids, on the other hand, are not sad at all. They are living in a room the size of most closets and lovin’ it.
Parents find themselves alone for the first time without kids to supervise and with absolutely no idea how to refocus.
This new stage of life takes a bit longer for parents to love than it does for the college gang, say maybe two weeks. By then, we are dusting off our dreams and getting busy reinventing ourselves.
On move-in day there are a few perks worth noting.
Parents can commiserate with one another comparing horror stories about college move-in days.
Students can commiserate with each other comparing whose parents were the “nerdiest” and whose acted the most stupid.
And years later when no longer at odds, parents and grown kids finally get on the same page.
Once again, parents work hard to set up a new apartment for the recent college grad or help the newlyweds find their first house or paint a nursery.
Move-in days never end.
You will never want to be without them.
