In a few months, my daughter, Clementine, will be leaving for college. And when I say “leaving,” I mean really leaving: she is going to school over 1700 miles away. (Apparently she is under the impression that I will no longer be able to write columns about her if she moves that far away, which is ridiculous: I wrote about her when she was doing a study abroad her junior year of high school, and she was on an entirely different continent at the time.)
Many people have given me all sorts of advice about how to deal with the fact that one of my children is leaving the nest. Some of the advice has been directed towards the apparently inevitable depression that follows, but by far the most advice has been how to deal with the stress that occurs when she (also apparently inevitably) moves back in. In other words, I have had plenty of people warn me that I should be prepared for Clementine to “bounce back” home. (This phrase has always seemed rather foreboding to me, since logically the only way something can “bounce back” to you is if you threw it away in the first place with significant force—something I don’t think anyone really recommends you do with your children.)
In any event, people have been helpfully telling me all summer that I should hold off on turning her room into a sewing room (as if), or a den (do people still even have those anymore?), grow room (way too ambitious) or even a guest room. I should instead just “wait and see.” To them I reply that there is no need to set up a contingency plan: I have everything under control. I am absolutely positive that after this summer, Clementine will never want to spend a significant amount of time in this house again. How, they ask, can you be so sure? It’s actually very simple.
I bought her little brother a banjo. One that he really likes to play.
Did I mention that their bedrooms share a common wall?
This may seem, at first blush, to be unnecessarily cruel. It may seem to be complete overkill, just as it was when the little old lady swallowed the horse to get rid of the fly. And, I will admit that this may be true; after all, no one has ever accused me of “too much subtlety.” It also, however, is completely necessary.
It’s not that I am so against the idea of Clementine moving back home that I am willing to do anything to keep her away (I didn’t buy him bagpipes, after all). It’s just that I think moving back home should always be your last option, and I’m more than willing to help make that be the case. Can’t stand your new roommate? Your little brother plays the banjo. Cafeteria food is disgusting? Your little brother plays the banjo. Someone took your clothes out of the dryer before they were done? Your little brother—you get the idea.
Look, all I’m saying is that, even with the constant threat of me writing about her toilet paper buying habits hanging over her head, it still takes a lot to to trump the free laundry, internet, and fully stocked pantry that comes with living with your parents. And a banjo-playing little brother might be just the edge I need to tip the scales from “barely tolerable” to “completely intolerable.” It might be just the catalyst that she needs to help her not only leave the nest, but actually fly.
And if it’s not, then there is always Plan B. After all, I’m sure it can’t be that hard to get Mumford and Sons to play a house party at your house.
Every night.