Wait. Is it Year or Years? I’m saying it over and over in my head and I hear it both ways.

Wow. This is sad. I’m 46 and I swear I’m losing my mind. Not that I’m going crazy. Too late there. I’m just losing basic pieces of information that I’m pretty sure I once stored in my brain. I blame all the passwords I now have to remember to access everything from my two voicemails to my home and work computers to my e-mail to my super-secret bank account info. I’ve got more seven number-letter combos floating through my head that something had to go. But that’s another journal.

So Happy New Year(s)!

Sorry this journal is a day late. I’ve been hanging with my son, Trevor. I’ve told you before that the weeks he’s with me are the only ones where my world feels right. The older he gets the fewer of those weeks exist.

He’s a sophomore in college and it turns out I wasn’t prepared for him to have his own life. I saw it coming. Told myself what was about to happen. Told others around me. Turns out I talk a good game.

So it’s 3 AM and I’m wide-awake regretting something that hasn’t even happened yet… tomorrow. Tomorrow he’s gone again, back to college halfway across the country. The nine days we spent together felt like 12 minutes. Personally I think it’s a cruel joke God plays on parents. The older you get the more you see how life is about the moments you spend with your family and dear friends and the less time everyone has for that.

In my head I hear my buddy Rick singing, “The cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon, little boy blue and the man on the moon. When you coming home son? I don’t know when.” Ricky has the same twisted, mental problems I have and he thinks this is funny.

As you know I’m a big sap. I may have a crusty, sarcastic exterior, but it’s a sham. It’s thinner than wet paper. Inside I’m a jumble of melted butter and soggy toast. So I lay here awake thinking about such things. I know there are thousands of other parents all over everywhere dealing with the same thing. Letting go of your kids sucks. I don’t care what you say. It sucks. You can’t tell me it’s freeing. Because it’s not. Those are just words you talk yourself into. And if that gets you through the night than you’re one up on me. I have to rely on Goody’s nighttime powder.

I’ve married recently and have plans to create a couple more of these beautiful little heart stealing varmints. I figure about the time I get a handle on letting go of Trevor I’ll have a couple more teenagers who don’t want to hold my hand in public. Life is beautiful, isn’t it?

Well, I’ll get the boy on a plane later today and then Andy and I will get back on the road for Carolina Traveler.

I sense somewhere between my soggy toast and warm butter that 2007 is going to be an interesting year for me.

My prayer for all of you this year is that you get a few extra hours, maybe even a whole day, with those closest to your heart.

Don’t forget to stop and smell the people,

Mike Redding