The Parentals

All throughout high school, I was always pretty close with my mom. We never really got into any arguments and we were always pretty chill with each other. Everyone always told me how much they envied my relationship with my mom and asked how I did it. I just usually shrugged and couldn't think of a response to that question.

Every day after school me and my mom would talk and I would tell her as much as I wanted her to know about my life, always leaving out just a couple details and then she would tell me about her day. So I guess, yeah, it was a pretty good relationship.

But now that I've gone away to college, I'm lucky if I talk to my mom once a week. And I haven't exactly figured out how I feel about that. I mean, she's not making the initiative to call me more often, but then again I don't see myself picking up the phone to call her more often either.

And as I've been here at schools I have seen people way above and below me on the phone-calling spectrum. I have friends who talk to their parents at least twice a day on the phone, and then friends who have called home once or twice in the past couple of months.

For example, one of my friends who talks to her mom on a daily basis comes into my room every day to complain how much her parents are trying to control her life. And everyday I tell her the same thing. "You're in college now and you need to start thinking and making decisions on your own." Shes tells me how her parents will only support her if she does what they want her to do in life. And day after day, she picks up the phone and calls to asks for their advice. I just feel like all her conversations ever bring are arguments and frustration.

And I see stuff like that and it makes me glad to know that I still have a good strong realtionship with my parents, even if that means I'm talking to them as often as I used to.

So are my parents trying to make me more independent by not calling me often? Are they slowly preparing me for the real world when I will no longer recieve any financial help from them and live on my own? Or are we both just to busy to talk on the phone anymore? I really don't know.