Answers

I remember dating, and having 'crushes', and speaking on the phone, before cellphones, or computers, or email.  Song lyrics that are now classics include 'waiting by the phone' for some certain someone to call, showing their continued interest.  I don't miss those times, or a time when a call from a 'crush' was all I could think about.  Now it's similar in waiting to hear from a child.  An offspring, adult size; still a child inside.

To know he's alright makes for sounder sleep.  To know there's been minimal trauma from the past few days or so in last getting a text and the contents of the exchange being enough to know he's okay, for the most part, in what is 'normal' to him, with no basis for comparison after so many years in this existence.  He has it better than a lot of children, yet knowing the alternatives has offered no consolation, when every effort was made to provide more, with no result, because others got involved who had no real interest other than common incentives that were nothing about a childhood.

It doesn't get any easier, it just changes.  Variations on a similar theme.  The years coming are less than what has passed, yet one day or moment could define the next, for better or worse.

When grandparents were my age there were 'permanent' homes grandchildren could go to.  As yet there is no permanent home.  I have to remind him to choose a school in a place he might stay past graduation and put down roots, so a future grandmother can finally put down roots and set up a grandma's house that feels as safe and secure as other grandparents', past, present, and future.

Home will be in the same place, sooner rather than later, yet it still seems far away, just out of reach.  Making the most of every day has never been felt more; each day builds upon the next.

It could be years before I ever learn what he may be thinking lately, not having seen me for so long; he has to know or been able to figure it out, if he thinks about it, when he does.  It's nothing I can ask about, now or soon.

Hearing from him and knowing he's okay are answered prayers.  Peace of mind enough to function one more day: all we have at a time anyway.  It makes hearing from a 'crush' many years before he was born seem trivial  and almost insignificant.  There is no real comparison, other than the emotion of communication gone 'well' allows one to sleep in some sort of relevant peace, for a completely different set of reasons.  That I needed to hear the voice of a crush to lift my spirits in the past only speaks to conditioning that is no longer relevant or useful.  Hearing from a child whose world is surreal yet all he's ever known to be able to rest until a tomorrow that is not promised cannot compare to the hollow gratification that fed the insecurity of youth and surroundings.

One answer is a change of environment, which can't compare to now, a preoccupation with that future home is enough, even if all there is is today, and his answer, it has to be enough, for now.