There are train tracks that run not too far from our house and down the hill (what the entire local population calls the Bluff, for it is, actually, just that, which stretches all along the shore of Lake Michigan) from our little neighborhood. At the bottom of the Bluff is the rail yard where sometimes in the summer, when the windows are open you can hear the train cars clang together. Train whistles are common and, because of this often go unnoticed, even in the early morning hours, for as with anything you adjust to your surroundings.
Which is how I always know when I am more agitated or stressed or worried. I start hearing the train that comes through sometime during the 6:00 a.m. hour. Even when the windows are closed against the sudden chill of fall air, the sound pierces my slumber. The engineer has to blow his whistle at the one road crossing to warn any potential cars, and I swear he gives a shorter blast then typical on account of the early hour (as if apologetic to all of us still abed) and the very light traffic the road receives, but I awaken all the same.
Yet my mind is also like a freight train these days (heck, all summer) in keeping with our pace as we work on finishing the interior of our camp, attempting to stay afloat with all the day to day minutiae of running a household, and now with Isabelle starting kindergarten. My emotions have run the gamut that all parents do .... happy, proud, and a maybe a tiny bit sad to know one phase is over, but mostly anxious.... anxious because it is in my nature to worry and because I want her to above all be happy and content and to do well ..... what EVERY parent wants for his or her own child.
But we get on many new trains during the course of our lives so, we climbed on board our new one this week and Isabelle went off to elementary school and had a fantastic first day as we told her she would despite her own jitters. And despite my over-active mind, and the six a.m. train whistle I keep hearing I too, am going to enjoy this ride just like I have enjoyed all the others. Sometimes you just have to get used to the sound of the wheels on the tracks.
