Two Babies Go to College
It's been a journey to arrive at this very big week.
My wife decided not to use her more advanced emotional intelligence or her much more widely read Substack to write about our twins heading off to college this week. “The universe does not need another post about this rite of passage, so I’ll spare you,” was how she put it in her latest post.
Which leaves a wide open lane for this more shameless member of the family to share his thoughts on the subject…
After 18 years of dedicated and unrelenting parental service, we dropped Elm off at RISD on Sunday and then dropped Clio off at Wesleyan yesterday.
When we learned, back in 2006, that we were pregnant with twins, the idea took some getting used to. We never pictured ourselves as twin parents. We had envisioned a single baby, one who would sleep peacefully through the night, who we could haul around to restaurants and show off at parties. Four hands, one baby—that’s how you’re supposed to start. The universe, however, had other plans.
But once we got used to the idea, we started to warm to it. We had wanted two kids and here they were. One stop shopping, and no starting all over again in a couple of years! Raising twins, however, is not for the faint of heart.
To start with, it was a whole lot of baby for my relatively small wife to carry. By eight months, she was densely populated and ready to evict.
And they didn’t get any lighter once they came out.
Every experience had to happen twice at the same time… Some were fun.
Others not so much.
But for the first five years, our experience was about on par with every other parent of twins: Two infants to feed, two crawlers to keep away from sharp objects, two toddlers to wrangle as they wobbled in opposite directions.
Jane wrote a very fine memoir about it all.
And then, at age 5, Clio was diagnosed with leukemia.
Sibling dynamics—let alone twin dynamics—during a journey with a life-threatening childhood illness is something only those who’ve been through it can fully understand… Jealousy, abandonment issues, parental guilt. It’s a lot.
We struggled, but we all made it to the other side.
At age 7, Clio finished treatment. At age 10, she reached the statistical mark called “survivorship.” And slowly, slowly our lives began to return to something resembling normal. Nightmares and nightmarish scenarios were replaced by the ho-hum twin-parent dilemmas of school parents’ evenings: Who’s meeting with which teacher?? Divide and conquer is a way of life with twins.
At least they had to stand in alphabetical order at graduation.
Which brings us back to this week’s college drop-offs—when, man, were we grateful not to have to move them both in on the same day.
And off they went. A little nervous, but more than ready.
We couldn’t be prouder of these two monkeys. Not for what they’ve accomplished—which is already so much—but for who they are. Curious, kind, kinetic.
Despite ourselves, we seem to have done OK.
And now, like our kids, we have a whole new adventure in front of us. A doubly empty nest, like raising twins, is intense. That eerie quiet in our house since dropping them off is going to take a whole lot of getting used to. Even I, with my male-level emotional intelligence, know there will be some lonely days ahead as we adjust.
But for the next ten days, we’re taking the advice of wise friends and giving ourselves a little vacation from reality.
We’ll deal with the future when we’re back.
wonderful! so glad to be a witness to this journey, brother. you guys have raised two amazing humans.
What a wonderful story, beautifully told: complete with joy, anxiety, terror and celebration. This is indeed a huge moment. I can’t wait to hear the songs you will write and sing this fall as you respond to the “quiet in the house.”