Going to Yale and growing away from your parents

By Molly Jane Rhodes

The hour after the president and dean give their welcoming address could be described as the first official Hour of Parting between you and your parents. You've spent the past 24 hours in intense, sweaty proximity to one another, emeshed in various stages of opening and unpacking; it will be another week, at least, before you reach the stage of "settling in." You've surpassed all levels of toleration and common courtesy, but somehow your parents feel compelled to linger a little longer, fingering fresh Co-Op purchases as if they were items in a dowry they were using to give you away. And now, on the heel of speeches meant to pump you full of anticipation for the next four years in your "new home," there's no excuse for the changing of the guard, the "Good-bye," to be put off any longer.

This was, anyway, the scene that unfolded before me as I peeled myself out of my seat in Woolsey Hall and made my way back to Old Campus; lots of mothers clinging to shoulders and handkerchiefs, lots of fathers concentrating hard on the ground and stroking the backs of their heads. I expected my parents to be waiting for me back in the suite, tastefully removed from the fray, ready with a mildly heartbreaking, though not prolonged, send off. What I got, instead, was a note tacked to my door: "We took off. See you later."

I was, not so mildly, shocked. Was this the way parents were supposed to behave? I took immediate solace in a high school friend and a hot fudge sundae, but I couldn't wrap my mind around the affront to protocol. My mother's only explanation when I called them later on that night--she sounded surprised to hear my voice, like I was a cousin she hadn't talked to in a while--was, "Well, we didn't want to end up making a scene. It wouldn't be appropriate to invade your space."

This new trend continued into my first parents' weekend, when they showed up for a couple of hours at a master's tea ("nice man, a little old") and dinner and then quickly returned to downtown Manhattan. I was adopted by one of my Californian suitemates' families for the rest of the time. My parents haven't been to a parents weekend since ("it doesn't really have anything to do with us, and besides, we've seen it all before").

When my boxes had to be collected the end of freshman year, my father insisted on leaving New York right after morning rush hour and returning before the evening traffic, a pattern that he has perfected ("can we just grab a sandwich? I've already been here three hours") on all subsequent departures and arrivals. I, in turn, spent about two weeks total back home my entire freshman year; if my parents were pushing me out then, damnit, I was going to love Top Ramen for dinner, every dinner, even over Thanksgiving and spring breaks.

Right at the start of my sophomore year, I started having weekly doctor appointments in New York--not for reasons even remotely life threatening--but, because of the timing, I ended up having breakfast with my mother each morning. We would meet in a coffee shop or a diner--neither "her space" at home nor "my space" at Yale--and we would talk. About whatever two people who had once had joined lives and still feel a connection talk about. For a half hour or so, I would tell her my interests and thoughts and she would offer hers. And then we would part.

I haven't shown this to them, but I think my father would be pleased to see I've written something for public consumption ("Why don't you write more? You always used to write"). My mother would catch me on the Co-Op-as-dowry line. "It's not strictly a dowry, really," she would say, over one of the dinners we now have together every other weekend. "I mean, yes, I suppose I did have to give you away. But not to anyone else. To you. I'm only trying to give you to you."

Molly Rhodes is a senior in Morse.

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