Milestones & Meaning

By Liz Stapp

Last week, I turned 50. 

I didn’t dread turning 50; I was grateful. My dad died at 57. He was young. Too young. I was 30 when he passed. For the past two decades, his death forced a kind of inventory I hadn’t planned. I’ve made some hard shifts in my health, in my relationships, and in how and where I spend my energy. 

Milestones don’t scare me anymore. They clarify.

But this most recent milestone shook me. A few days before my birthday, I dropped my son (my youngest) off for his freshman year of college. I’m officially an empty nester. 

Just a minute ago, I was rocking him to sleep, wrapped in his light blue baby blanket. Now I’m standing in a dorm room that smells mildewy with too many extension cords. Despite trying to hold back tears, they decide on their own to roll down my face. 

I tried to prepare for the moment. I knew how this scene would play out. I had dropped my daughter off at college three years earlier. But back then, I didn’t realize what the drop off meant–that she would become a visitor rather than a resident in my home (or nest).

I read the essays and saw the photos of parents saying goodbye in Target-furnished dorms, hearts full and breaking. But what most of those stories don’t say (and the part I can’t stop thinking about) is that moments like these are quiet tests of everything we poured in. And they hurt. 

I hugged him one more time. Told him he had everything he needed to do everything he wanted. Then I watched him walk away.

My heart wasn’t so much hollowed out as it was like taking apart a jigsaw puzzle. Its pieces were scattered, no longer fitting together. 

My son was born barely a year after my dad died. In those months before, my heart felt hollow. Irrevocably broken. I was certain I’d never feel whole again. Then I held him. My new baby boy. He was so quiet, so still. The doctor handed him to me, and he looked up at me and smiled. The nurse insisted it was gas. I knew better. In that moment, my heart was full. He was everything we needed. Our family's missing puzzle piece.

Now, as he walked away, I felt that old hollow feeling stirring again. But it wasn’t the same. It wasn’t emptiness exactly. It was the ache of a puzzle being taken apart, pieces pulled loose, a shape undone.

My recent birthday gift.

When I returned home, I opened the birthday gift he left behind. It was his baby blanket. The same soft, light blue one he held when he was scared, tired, or just needed to know I was close. I held it and cried.

Not because I was sad, exactly. But because I understood what he was telling me. The puzzle looks different now, but it’s still together. And whether he meant to say it or not, he was telling me that he was ready. It’s time.

These milestone moments ask something of us. Tears and grief create a reckoning. What does our life mean?  Have we done our jobs? What lies ahead for us? 

These are questions I wrestle with not only personally, but professionally. In my work at the W.W. Reynolds Foundation, it’s important to ask what kind of future we’re preparing young people to step into. Bill and I talk about the challenges that lie ahead for them. The economy. The state of education. The legacy of debt our generations are leaving behind for the next.

If our answer is just college, we’ve missed the point. If we hand them a degree and call it preparation, we’ve given them a map with no compass.

I don’t want my kids (or yours) to be college-ready. I want them to be life-ready. Steady under pressure. Curious when things go sideways. Grateful for the people who walk beside them. Aware of the responsibilities that come with freedom. Willing to take risks, make mistakes, and learn from them. But most importantly, I want them to be good citizens. I want them to make people’s lives better.

That’s the work we support at the W.W. Reynolds Foundation, too.

This year, we partnered with Mike Rowe—of Dirty Jobs fame —to support his national curricular initiative focused on grit, work ethic, and responsibility. The students in those programs aren’t memorizing facts for a test. They are learning how to show up on time, solve real-world problems, and take pride in their hard work. No shortcuts. No safety nets. Just the kind of lessons that last because they’re earned.

The Foundation doesn't fund programs so students can ace quizzes, get into college, and get jobs. We support work that prepares them for the moments that don’t come with rubrics: when no one is watching, when integrity is tested, when purpose matters.

Because when that moment comes and they leave home and the active parenting years quietly end, we want more than a résumé to show for it. We want resilience. Direction. Character.

My son left me his blanket. The one he once held when he needed comfort. He’s given it back, recognizing that I need its comfort now and trusting I’ll understand what that means.

I do.