The Boys are Back

     We were empty nesters for exactly nine months.
     The house was quiet, clean and orderly.  While I missed my boys, I did not miss their wet towels on the  floor, their dirty dishes in every room, or their STUFF.  Rob has graduated college and Jesse is home for the summer, so naturally there is a George Forman grill in my foyer, a night stand in my living room, and  seven baskets of clean laundry lined up in the hallway that will never make it into the drawers.
     At high school graduation, parents cry because their children are leaving.  At college graduation, parents cry because their children are coming home.
     Now there is a good chance my boys are reading this, and I don't want them to think I'm not happy to have them--I LOVE having them home--but it's going to take a little adjusting.
     I was never the neat one.  That distinction goes to my poor husband whose head is going to explode like my laundry room full of dirty socks. But it's not just the mess.  My car keys are not in my purse.  My computer charger is not in my office.  The kitchen scissors will have to be re-named.
    Every night I clean up my kitchen after dinner and put everything away.  I go to bed.  When I wake up in the morning, I find that there has been a dinner party in my house overnight.  Every pot and pan has been used.  Every plate and bowl is out.  A pound of lunch meat, a loaf of bread, a half pound of cheese, two bags of chips and a box of ice cream bars have vanished.  Whatever was leftover from dinner has been consumed, a bag once containing 42 potstickers is in the trash, and the rice maker has burnt residue on the bottom.
     It has been my life's work to keep the refrigerator filled for my big boys and their friends, I'm just out of practice.  It's a task that requires daily dedication and religious zeal.  I worship at Costco.  I am often asked by chuckling strangers what I feed my boys, and I tell them my secret: I feed them everything I have.
     How many people, you might ask, are eating at Chez Solomon between 11:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m.?  I only learned recently that our house is the preferred destination after midnight.  Although our house isn't big, it's a ranch, so the bedrooms are far from the living area, unlike a two story where parents can hear everything going on right below.  I woke up at 2 a.m. to go to the bathroom the other night and opened my bedroom door to see if the boys were home. There were a lot of people in my house.  I heard someone playing the piano, and PEOPLE WERE SINGING.
     It might be difficult to imagine I could sleep through all this, but it's true.  When I go to bed around 11, the boys aren't home yet.  When I wake up in the morning, the boys are asleep in their rooms.  Who knows what shenanigans have occurred in my house over the years when I assumed my sweet boys were asleep in their beds?  (If you know, I beg you not to tell me.)
     The only bright side is that I am sure that my boys will never have a party when we aren't home.  I know you are raising your eyebrows at this bold statement, but I know this for a fact:  In order to prevent us from knowing that a party occurred, they would have to clean up after themselves.
     Never gonna happen.