Mom, I need a plunger!

My son Andrew recently turned 18 but he has been wise beyond his years ever since he popped out of me and his tiny head was crowned with a yellow thick beanie that made the nurses in the hospital say he was an old soul. When Andrew was born, I was experiencing peri (and postpartum) depression. It seemed to me by the way he looked at me that he knew he had to be an easy baby. He certainly was that, and also a very easy toddler and tween and now teen!

When Andrew was 2, his dad and I separated and soon after divorced. I stayed in his dad's town so that Andrew could be near to both of us. Andrew never really knew a happy domestic life that included both his parents. After the divorce, I remember thinking I would never marry again, and that no one would want to date a single mom of a toddler anyway. But then a friend of mine told me something that resonates to this day, "God made you a mom but also God made you a woman!" Very true! I had never thought about it that way and so, with that in mind, decided to pursue a lovely gentleman from my tennis club named Mikhail (Misha) who answered my advances and to make a long story short, married me in 2012, when Andrew was 9.

Andrew and I lost Misha in 2019. I was 50 and I remember my mom came from Mexico for support and to attend the funeral. She later relayed that the first thing Andrew said to her at the airport was, "Abuela, my mom's a widow at 50." Misha's death was barely penetrating our reality and had not even begun to sink in. He had died suddenly and instantly of a pulmonary embolism. The last words I said to Misha were, "I love you," and Andrew and he shared Misha's last moments of normalcy over a midnight cheese snack.

Well, this blog post is not about Misha's death or grief, it's about where both Andrew and I are in life. Andrew flew to Vancouver on September 02, 2021, to attend Vancouver Film School and is enrolled in their film production program. I remember when he got the acceptance letter. It was like he had won the lottery, as there were only 9 spots available, and every year they get 50,000 inquiries, 25,000 applicants out of which 1,300 are accepted across all of their programs. Film Production is their most popular program and only 216 get in but because of COVID there were only 9 spots for the fall 2021 entry, and so Andrew got one of those 9 spots!

Andrew flew to Vancouver by himself and had already found a studio apartment during a previous trip with his dad, so at least he knew he had a bed to come home to. I had been told it was a furnished studio, but later I learned it meant that it still needed sheets, a shower curtain, dishes, and because Andrew had suffered a migraine on the day he flew out there alone, he barfed in the toilet, and called me from his lonely dwelling to say, "Mom, I need a plunger!"