This just in...Kids move out, puppy moves in!

I swear I didn't mean to- I was just walking by one of those sidewalk puppy fairs. The ones where you know not to stop, lest you feel tempted. I stopped. I got tempted.

It had not even been 48 hours since my son left San Francisco to move to New York. After a ridiculously teary goodbye (and I wasn't the only one crying) I watched him drive down our steep hill in a stranger's '98 VW beetle, (one of those win-win arrangements made via Craiglist) driving a stick-shift after a quick 2-hour lesson, and knowing it would be a pretty long time until I saw him again. Oh, and it was raining.

Though he hasn't lived in my house for years, I still felt a palpable silence. Now that I think about it, maybe that was inside my head, but it was present nevertheless. I spent the rest of the day moping about, watching poor TV and tearing up a lot. Though the logical half of my brain (at least I think it takes up half) reminds me that this is a positive development, a perfect time in the life of a 24-year old to experience something new and different. It's what I would have done. It's what I did do.

So two days later I found myself walking down Market St, I saw the puppy. She was so needy, so thin, so...hungry looking...in that cage that I had to take her home just to feed her. I found out that we actually shared a name, albeit for odd reasons. She was being called "D.D", short for ditch dog where she had been found. She was under a year and she needed some love from a foster family and I nominated myself for the job. My husband was surprisingly OK with the plan and we took her home, immediately renaming her Bella and introducing her to our 6 year old dog, Izzy.

After a week of fostering, I now recognize a few things about myself. One- I am a sucker (I wish I could say this surprised me), Two- I get very quickly attached (again, stating the obvious here) and three- I should not keep her. She's been a grand diversion, so she's fulfilled her role in my life. And I have fulfilled mine. Her ribs no longer show.

But it was an important lesson for me...for all moms really when we go through this sea-change with our grown kids.  I know that my kids will always need me on some level (my son called me from Ohio for help in finding a supermarket). It's just not in the same way I've been there for them for all these years. It's a drastic job description change.

And I know that now, I need to start taking care of myself. In understanding what that means, my mind drifts to all the times I have flown. The tedious safety instructions are always the same - word-for-word on every airline. "If you're traveling with a child, place your mask on your face first, then assist your child."

That's not as easy as it might sound. Yeah, on an airplane I get it. But extrapolating that wise advise and applying it to my life is a bit more challenging when my maternal instinct has always been to help my kids first and think later.

I may have had to say goodbye to my son and I may have to say goodbye to Bella, but I learned a lot this week and I know they are very important lessons in my "mom education". Just when I think I am oh so smart, another lesson gets thrown in my face. Where the hell did I put that oxygen mask?