A Mother's worries

I remember one time when I had lunch with a man I was dating. I think we were in the TCU cafeteria. Anyway, his plate had chicken-fried steak and mashed potatoes and gravy. I looked at him in horror and said, "You don't have anything green on your plate." He rolled his eyes and said, "Once a mother, always a mother." Well, today, I've had proof of that in spades. In the face of the worst storm Colorado has seen in years, my oldest son, Colin, is driving from Houston to Colorado. Oh, he's got good cause. His pregnant wife is in Colorado Springs alone; they're supposed to close the sale of their house there tomorrow morning, load everything into a U-Haul, and drive to Texas, with Colin driving the U-Haul and Lisa driving their pickup. Now he'll have to tow the Nissan behind the U-Haul. I'm not ready tonight to even think about their drive from the Springs--I just want to get him there to be with Lisa. It's been a day of phone calls, with my brother calling frequently because of his concern after talks with friends in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. Once when I called Lisa, she answered with, "Information Central. How may I help you?" But tonight, she tells me Colin is almost to Dumas, Texas--in the Panhandle, a bit beyond Amarillo, where he had promised to stop for the night--and she had already reserved a room for him.
Why do children still try to trick their parents? This morning when I talked to Colin and he was still in sunny southern Texas, he said, "I hope Morgan handles the trip okay. So far she's fine." Now Morgan is 18 mos. old and I knew very well she was in Houston with her grandparents and not in the car with her daddy! I told him not to even go there, and he laughed. But sometime during the day, I said that if they didn't make it to Houston for Christmas, it wasn't the end of the world. Morgan would be with her grandparents, and she wouldn't know she'd missed Christmas with her parents. He told me soundly that was the least of his worries.
I think I've raised a most sensible kid, and maybe I don't give him--or any of them--enough credit. I continue to worry. Colin said to me today, "Mom, I'm not a risk taker," even as I had visions of him trying to cross Raton Pass in the snow in the middle of the night. But, you know, he's 37 years old, he has a wife, daughter, and a son on the way, a responsible and good job, and he's right--he's not a risk taker. It's hard to get rid of a lifetime of worrying about your children, but I need to learn to do it. They're good people, and they can take care of themselves and their families--and maybe even, occasionally, me!
This is Colin with his daughter, Morgan. Naw, he doesn't like her much!