Time is closing in on me.  I can feel it–as if I am in a room and the walls are closing in.  The air is getting thin and I am finding it harder and harder to breathe.  If I think about it too long-5 seconds or more-I can work myself into a panic attack.  My stomach starts to flip flop and I can even break a sweat.  It is actually going to happen. And soon.  On Wednesday, it will be a mere month away.  We will take Mini Me to college on August 20.  Part of me would like to lock him in the dog crate.  He would fit.  I could put a padlock on the outside and just keep him there.  I know I would never get away with that.  He is far to loud and boisterous.  He has started doing his own laundry this summer.  Do not say a word. NO, I haven’t ever made him do it before! I have enjoyed every moment of doing his laundry! Okay, well maybe not every moment, but I have not hated it!  Okay, okay. At times, yes, I have hated it-but only because I knew he was putting dirty clothes on top of clean clothes that he had not put away, and I was having to do all of the laundry over again!  His laundry has been my job, and I have done it well.  I have sort of missed doing his laundry.  NO, I do not want him to mail it to me from Nashville.  He can keep on doing it himself.  He says he is actually going to hand wash everything.  I am interested to see how long that will last! 😉  I am getting sick just writing this.  I want to trash it and go do something else and pretend I never started this.  Maybe that will make it all go away.  I know it won’t.  I know that Mini Me is perfectly capable of taking care of himself while he is at school.   I don’t want him to make the same mistakes I made.   How do I stop that from happening? I know I can’t.  I  can only hope that I have taught him well.  I know that everyone has to make their own choices and mistakes and learn from both.  I want to hold his hand. I want to be there to tuck him in at night, and be there when he wakes up in the morning.  I want to protect him from all of the evils that lurk in the shadows of college…..Then I remember that he is not going to Athens.  He isn’t me.  He hasn’t already started off on the wrong foot.  He pretty much knows what he wants to do–I did not at his age, or 5 years later, or even now.  God, I am going to miss him, and his music that has filled our home since he was 10 years old.  It’s going to be too quiet-even with The Middle Child and The Baby still here.  Maybe I will take up guitar at the ripe old age of 45….