Of Humpback Whales and Empty Nests

I remember vividly the first day I spent alone with my oldest son. My husband was heading back to work after having taken some time off for our son’s birth, and that morning when he left I stood at the doorway feeling lost.  I remember thinking, “Now what? What do I do with this baby for eight solid hours, especially since he’s terrible at carrying on a conversation?”

We managed to get through that first day, and all the subsequent ones until he could talk and finally got more interesting. And then his younger brother came along, and the days turned into years and before I knew it they both were raised. Honestly, it was just yesterday I was standing at the door feeling forlorn because I had no idea how to fill all those hours until my husband came home again.

This fall we sent our youngest son off to college, and once again I’m feeling a bit forlorn, though with the understanding that this too shall pass and that there are definite advantages to not having teenagers in the house.

Curiously, what I find myself thinking about is humpback whales.

We went whale watching on our Boston trip this summer, on a ship that is based in Gloucester on Cape Ann. We set out from the harbor on a two-hour boat ride, leaving shore far behind as we chugged through the waves. It was a brilliantly sunny, warm day, and we were fortunate in that once we reached the deep water, we enjoyed a full hour of absolutely glorious whale-watching. We saw more than twenty humpbacks doing a wide range of whalish behaviors, including the humpback’s signature move of leaping into the air. The breaching seems to defy physics, for how can such a huge animal propel itself so high? And why do they expend so much effort on something that doesn’t seem to have a clear purpose?

As we stood mesmerized on the deck, oohing and ahhing at each leap, our guide pointed out one whale in particular, a smallish animal that was leaping over and over into the air. “That one’s a young male,” she said. “He almost always acts like that.”

Well, of course he’s a young male, I thought. Having raised two sons, I recognized the resemblance–that joy in showing off, that fearless exuberance. When the whale dived under our boat at one point, appearing on the other side a few seconds later, I could swear I saw a grin on his face. I know I’m anthropomorphizing, but, really, that whale was your classic teenage boy.

So here’s the image that’s going through my mind these days. Seeing your kids after they leave home for the Big Wide World is like whale watching. Once they’ve left your nest, you have to make considerable effort to travel to their habitat. And even then, you can only get brief glimpses of them and must guess at what their lives are about.

My sons are now swimming in deep waters far from shore, but I cherish the occasional sightings I get. Here I stand on the boat deck, watching as they leap, feeling dazzled and awestruck and amazed.