Solo Daddy

Bec went to Montreal with her mom and sister this weekend. It used to be a tradition BC, but she missed last year because Quinn was too young for her to be away. Flash forward one year, and well, we weren't entirely sure Quinn wasn't still to young for her to be away. We'd talked grand designs of prepping Quinn and Daddy for a solo flight, but too much work and a general lack of round tuits and here we were holding our collective breaths as Bec left for the train.

We'd discussed that probably having Quinn watch her board the train without him would be too much. However I fear we went a little far in the other direction. Bec's parents picked her up at home, and she said goodbye to Quinn, but then she just left, with us being hesitant to make a big deal out of her departure for fear of meltdown. I briefly considered waving with him from the window, but we were reading at the time and he gets in a reading zone, so we just kept reading. In the short term this seemed quite effective. He asked for mommy a couple times over the next few hours and I explained that she was away until tomorrow. He considered that for a moment and carried on.

Later, just before nap he was going up the stairs and he stopped. He turned around and looked at the door and waved and said "bye bye". It was said in a tone loaded with meaning, and it is one I will remember forever in the "emotion sears memories" sort of way. It was soft; it was vulnerable but confident; it wasn't sad; it was a bit resigned, but also content; and matter-of-fact - all at the same time. Then he turned and continued up the stairs. He went down great and had a great nap.

I didn't immediately identify it with mommy leaving, and in fact it's still not totally sure in my head. Just prior to that he'd been pointing to the light and smoke alarm on the front hall ceiling and said something that seemed to indicate he thought someone was out there. I briefly wondered whether it was one of those "I see dead people" moments from the movies with or without the macabre part, which freaked me out in a number of ways but I was able to quickly banish those thoughts. So when he waved bye bye I wasn't sure whether it was The Imaginary People or not. Only later did I piece together that he was probably waving to mommy, and perhaps even imagining mommy there. Whatever the case, I now wish we'd let him say goodbye more. Who knows, maybe he *would* have melted down; maybe there isn't a black and white answer.

In any event, he and I have done just fine together, and I am so glad he feels that comfortable with me. I think I'm much more boring than mommy, but I think I have managed the care and feeding of our son effectively over the weekend. I even recovered a couple minor meltdowns. My biggest fear was that he would lose it and want his mommy and be completely unrecoverable, but that didn't come to pass. In the end, after much anticipatory gnashing of teeth, I think it has been good for us all, and we'll all be excited to see one another in a couple hours' time.