Barbara's Wood's Dispatches from the Home Front: Whose house is this, anyway??? Barbara's Wood's Dispatches from the Home Front: Whose house is this, anyway??? (September 21, 2005)

I seem to be living in some one else's house lately.

I know it's not my house -- it's too quiet, too orderly, too clean, too empty of the voices of teenagers, of their telephones ringing, their friends dropping by, their music up too loud.

No one's been throwing towels on the floor of the bathroom for me to pick up, no one's been leaving the freezer door open a crack so everything inside melts, and no one's been leaving the light on in their bedroom, their computer playing music, the television on with a DVD on pause and going out for the evening.

I don't have to buy two different brands of peanut butter and three different types of sandwich bread or any soy products at all. A roll of paper towels lasts for weeks, not hours, the gas tank never seems to empty, and I don't have to hide the cookies to get some.

My house, which for most of this summer was filled with seven people, is now home to just three. My daughter Caitlin is back at San Diego State for her sophomore year. My son Riley is living in the dorms at San Francisco State. The 14-year-old Japanese exchange student is back in Japan and my 12-year-old nephew is back in Oregon with his mother.

It's just my husband, me, and our baby, who is a freshman at Woodside High School (and actually, she does still throw towels on the floor for me to hang up).

For the first time in 14 years I have no children in elementary school. I felt a little left out when I could hear their back-to-school barbecue going on and we weren't even invited, although everyone has since told me that we should have just gone on over.

I've been working on projects that I've been meaning to get to for at least four years, although I suspect it will take years more for me to get to all of them. And it's so much easier for me to accomplish things because I hardly ever get interrupted by someone who wants me to give them a ride, give them money, mend their pants, read their English paper, make them a sandwich or find the school supplies they need.

My whole life is different. I'll only have to go to Costco half as often; there will only be ONE back-to-school night; instead of buying four different kinds of pizza, two is all it takes to make everyone happy. With twice as many leftovers.

I will admit that every once in a while, in a long while, I miss them. This morning I watched a young mother peek in the window at the nursery school and smile whistfully as she watched her child play. "I remember doing that," I thought. "Looking in that same window and watching my baby after I left her for the first time." For a moment, I felt like running over, grabbing the mother by the shoulders and warning her -- "Look longer. Next thing you know they go off to college!"

But I didn't. It might have seemed like bragging.
Barbara Wood lives in Woodside in an old house filled with redheads and animals. Her column runs the third week of the month.

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