It’s the Baby Boomer’s quiet revolution. With universities and colleges reopening for a wide-eyed wave of first-year students, Canadian parents by the hundreds of thousands are embracing or bracing for … The Empty Nest.
Yes, sniffle, the last of our daughters is packing to leave for university, joining an exodus from Canadian homes that will inflict the greatest change on parental lifestyles since the day that first newborn came home from the hospital and REM sleep ceased to exist.
Our various houses have echoed to the sound of baby cries, pre-teen tantrums, sibling squabbles, later curfew pleas and car key demands for 26 consecutive years spanning three spectacularly beautiful daughters, if I do say so myself.
Why, the last time there wasn’t a Martin girl causing some sort of household mayhem, Pierre Trudeau was prime minister, a litre of gas cost 40¢ and the music charts were dominated by Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Hmmm, I guess some things haven’t changed.
Those ahead of us on the demographic curve insist we’re entering a co-habitation nirvana of sorts, the empty nest equivalent of big rewards from a frequent flyer program.
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Notes:
Don is moaning and groaning now but he can trust me on this. As soon as he adjusts he’s gonna love it.
Wow. Don Martin has a soft, vulnerable side!
Who knew?