The members of this family were, split up, living in different cities, because of work, and schooling too, translated…
If the metaphor of a family being a small nest is true, and after the nest had a few chicks, the parents took turns, watching over and finding food, do whatever they possibly could, to help the young grow. And one day, the babies decided to spread their wings and fly, and found where they belonged, and these two parent birds are now, old, we call this stage of life “empty nest”.
I have a female coworker, her husband is a teacher, their only son tested into a university away from their home, and started boarding at school, and only comes home on the weekends. As I’d learned about this, I’d joked on how she’s now, an empty nester, and that evening, I got a text from my son, saying that he is going to sing karaoke the whole night with his friends, that he’s not coming home the night. I’d looked at my empty nest, and shockingly discovered, that for the night, my house too, became, an “empty nest”, and there’s just, me, the old bird in it.
it’s, just me now…not my illustration…
Having married late, I’d had my son when I was thirty-six, and at age forty-four, I gave birth to my daughter. I am fifty-eight this year, my son is in his junior year in college, my daughter, second year in middle school, because of our work, my son stayed in Taipei with me on the weekends, and my daughter lives home with my mother in Kaohsiung, and only on the long holidays, or the winter or summer vacations, would we be reunited as a whole family. Although we were, separated, but with the technologies, we can use video conference all the time, to alleviate my missing my child.
As I wrote to here, I’d suddenly felt the urge, that I should, probably, head home, to visit my parents now.
So, this, is a split family, because of work, and, the family is used to living like this, but, as the children get older, and start to fly away, the parents would have a harder time, dealing with their empty nest, and, this is the time, that the parents may need to regroup, on the arrangement in living too.
Life, the Obstacle Course 