It was Yesterday

I'm sitting in the gym/cafeteria of Renaissance Academy waiting the final orchestra concert of the season. The chairs are hard and fold out. Luckily this time, we won't be asked to put them away because there is a "Twelfth Night" performance later that night. The small stage is set up like you'd expect for an orchestra setting, but the background is set up like something from Camelot.

The orchestra members are sitting nervously as the orchestra director gives them a few last minute instructions. One chair is empty right up front. It reminds me of a jack-o-lantern that is missing its front tooth. Normally, I would be amused at this image, but instead I realize that the missing chair is where my son is supposed to be. I duck out into the hall looking for him and spot him escorting one of his friends down the hall. I jokingly chide him a little, but the girl he is escorting tells me that he ...is being a gentleman and escorting her and they won't start without him. What more can I say to that? I return to my seat wondering when this boy became a young man. After all, it was only yesterday that he was little.

It was yesterday that this boy sat on the porch of our small apartment with a straw in his mouth which was attached to a smoothie cup that was almost as tall as he was. It was yesterday that this boy got out of the car to go to first grade when a cute little girl from his class grabbed his hand and they walked hand in hand to class. It was yesterday that this boy spent hours upon hours in his room playing Legos and trains. It was yesterday that this boy picked up the violin for the first time and I kept reminding myself that "he would get better." It was yesterday that he said "I'm going to take Arabic next year for my language" and next year he may be going to Egypt for a semester.

It was yesterday that he had his final orchestra concert at the charter school he has attended for the past five years. This boy young man sat confident (being the only 9th grade student in the orchestra) dressed in his green bow tie (that he has learned to tie himself and adopted as his own personal style), white shirt, dark pants and the sports jacket that he has taken from my closet. It is only slightly larger than he is. He did "get better" at the violin.

Sans white shirt, but rockin' the bow tie.

He'll start his Sophomore year at the High School in the Fall. He'll be driving in 13 months. This same girl he escorted down the hall will be one of the girls he dates.

I'm sure it will be tomorrow when he graduates from High School, leaves on a mormon mission, goes to college and gets married.

For the moment though, he's still sitting on that porch drinking the smoothie that is as big as he is because after all, it was only yesterday.