sleepy now

We returned from an epic college road trip up to the delightful greenery of Oregon, and we will be launching J to college up there for the coming year. It's a transitional program, with a couple dozen students, where they take a couple courses to learn How To College, and spend the rest of their time learning the many skills of How To Adult, like interpersonal and life skills stuff. It was amazing to watch J show up as himself, and the program staff really love him for it, and everybody all around settling in to the idea that he will live and thrive there. It was so perfect that we decided that we don't really need to be nearby while he's there, as we've always figured we would: having us available has always been the surest way for him not to need us.

But, we also know that he's capable of amazing things without us around, especially these days, and this place will help him as needed. The student:staff ratio approaches 1:1, and each student has 5 case managers in different areas, meeting with of them through the week. Sending him off on his own feels odd, but the core parenting goal is to raise a functioning adult, so...here we are.

It's a lovely college city, and it's entirely possible J could just continue there, since the university has good programs for what interests him, and he'll have spent a year getting to know the place. Plenty of time before that decision, though.

We brought the dog, because we were driving, and Leela's been getting older (obviously) and a bit more anxious lately, and not really in a good brainspace to be separated from us for 4 days. This was the first time we traveled with her since right after we got her in 2016, and she totally nailed it. We stopped every hour or so, to switch drivers and let her have a sniff and pee on things, and as we got up to the Oregon forests, you could see her tiny, tiny inner wolf perk up at all the new sights and sounds. We stayed in a very comfy 2-bedroom at the Marriott Residence Inn, which loves dogs in addition to having full kitchens.

Happily, we'll be back.