I'm Never Moving...Again

 I’m NEVER Moving…Again

By John W. Vander Velden

Oh, I don’t know where I will spend all my remaining days.  It seems unlikely that I will stay at this location forever.  But the events of the past ten days have taught me an important lesson…I’m not moving. 

Our son’s achievements resulted in his location to a new state.  Beginning your career is a big deal and he was SO excited.  We should have known the drill, we had moved him before, three times before. But things were a bit different this time.  Distance for one thing and Nick, like all of us, had with the passing of time gathered “things”.  There were his things and there were “our” things.  So, it turned out for our good fortune that the things were divided so we needed to move less stuff each day.  On a Thursday, we rented a U-Haul and Jackie and I rumbled down the two hours to campus and near day’s end rumbled back…and unloaded our furniture.  My back will remind me for weeks that hauling a chest-of-drawers upstairs alone was a mistake.  It was only thirteen steps for crying out loud.  Once it would not have caused a sweat, well, maybe a sweat, but nothing more.  But now…the task was pure insanity.

On Monday we started early, drove that two hours to “college” town and rented the truck there.  Nick lived on the ground floor.  I had forgotten just how big a plus that was.  We had him loaded by noon.  A quick lunch and Jackie and I were on the road.

A truck driver would have thought driving a 15 foot U-haul a piece of cake, but I’m not a truck driver.  So interstates, bumper to bumper traffic at speed, and construction narrowed lanes made an interesting four and a half hours.  It must have been crowding five when we entered a really nice quiet apartment complex and the _____ began.

Yes, I knew that the ground floor in West Lafayette simplified things, but…

Nick has a really nice apartment on the THIRD floor.  Oh by the way, did I mention the six flights of stairs.  I GUESS NOT!  I had help…thank goodness.  And Nick handled the heavy…downward ends…but I’m never doing that again…I MEAN NEVER!

It was after eight when I nearly passed out.  Upper eighties and 114+% humidity, with a thunderstorm on its way.  Maybe it was the heat, OK the heat didn’t help.  Maybe it was not eating for nearly nine hours, likely, my sugars had to be in the basement.  Maybe it was all of the above, but my world spun and things began to get dark.

Food!  There are times when it is EXTREMELY necessary to take the time.  Microwaves, and frozen stuff can be lifesavers…

We nearly beat the storm.  I did say NEARLY.  But we got the truck unloaded.

No matter how much stuff you have, you need something.  A Target run provide a couple of vitals so Nick could make the night.  Steak and Shake fed us…officially.  It was well after 11:00 when the U-haul found its way to the hotel where Jackie and I would rest our weary, and in my case “OLD” bones.

But through it all I learned an important lesson.  I’M NEVER MOVING AGAIN!   

(544 Words) 5-25-2018

What Parents Do...

What Parents Do…

By John W. Vander Velden

My mind is reeling.  It would be no surprise the events of last weekend, including Nick’s graduation, and preparations for his move, fill my mind to bursting.  So for this week’s post I offer some of my personal thoughts. 

We spent a few hours wandering the campus with Nick on Friday last.  Hard to imagine that he has spent so much time at the university, and it was the first time Jackie and I entered the Mechanical Engineering Building.  So our son showed us the senior projects that were on display, including his.  He took us to some of the lecture halls the computer lab and much of the world that had been his over the last five years.

We made the trip back to West Lafayette on Saturday, for pictures.  Those that know me understand how often my Nikon is found dangling around my neck.  So though the light was just plain terrible with the constant threat of rain, we walked miles and I did my best to capture Nick and “his” school.  Someday perhaps those images will mean something special to him…they mean something special to me.

As we raced about the central portion of the campus with Nick in his black robe and his gold stole, he was careful to keep his orange tassel on the right side, and not cross under the bell tower.  Superstitions and traditions blend in ways not always logical.  But underclassmen do not cross under the tower until they hold their signed diploma.  For five years Nick has made certain he never did, and Saturday was the last day he would take those few extra steps to go around the tower’s base.

We met up with Jackie’s nephew and family on that photo shoot.  Having driven from South Carolina, their company was an extra bonus.  Nick showed them about the

Nick spending a few moments with John Purdue and
his cousin Stephen

campus, as we dodged raindrops.

Sunday.  What can I say?  Our day started early.  We reached Nick’s apartment by seven and made the long walk to the Armory.  It was there we left him for a time surrounded by a sea of black capes mulling about in the early morning sun.  It is hard to describe a father’s thoughts as he watched the child he witnessed enter this world surrounded by so many others that began their lives in much the same way.  But your head tells you, those soon to graduate are not children any longer, but young men and women, that like Nick are ready to begin the next part of their lives, but your heart will not allow you to believe.  You remember the road that has at last led us all here…all the stumbles…all the achievements…all the ordinary days that matter the most.  You look on and wonder how we have reached this point.  You wonder what new challenges lie ahead for him, and pray he will face them and persevere.   You pray that he finds the success he seeks and that in some way he finds the happiness that he deserves…just as he has given a happiness to his mother and father all these years.

The Hall of Music is a grand space.  We sat there, and by chance, found ourselves in perfect seats.  With a name like Vander Velden he was not among the first to parade past.  There must have been four hundred or more soon to be engineers that walked at my elbow before Nick’s turn arrived. I saw him, standing tall in pride with the gleam of excitement in his eyes.  Five hard years and five Co-op rotations in his wake.  All the work and moments that led to this achievement…Nick’s graduation…on Mother’s Day 2018.

Did the world stop to take a breath?  Not likely.  But Jackie’s and mine did…for a moment…just the briefest of time…we found ourselves between what was and what would be.

I think that most parents feel the same way.  At graduation we never consider our costs that have helped our child.  No we see the significance of a change in a way that no other is able.  We bite our lip locking emotions in places from which they scream to be released.  But it is not the time…it is not our time, but Nick’s.  And we do nothing to take away even the slightest glory he so richly deserves.

That’s what parents do.  That’s what parents always do.

(730 Words)  5-18-2018







At last he could walk through the clock tower.

Congratulations Nicholas John Vander Velden
2018 Graduate Purdue University School of Mechanical Engineering

Spring Brings Changes

Spring Brings Changes

By John W. Vander Velden

It seems that spring has really arrived and with it comes changes.  A sure sign that the weather has changed is the grass.  It’s green for one thing and it’s growing like crazy for another.  It seems to be making up for the time it waited dormant.  If you don’t like mowing you would have been pleased with April, but May has sent us into extra innings already.

The trees are filling with new leaves, fresh and green, the fruit trees are in bloom.  I see lilacs in full flower, yes, spring is bursting out at last, and it brings changes.

But nature is not the only thing that announces that the summer grows near.  Sunday is not only Mother’s Day but also Nick’s graduation.  Our son has completed this stage of his education, and a university degree is something that set’s his parents’ minds reeling.  But I remember when he graduated from John Glenn High School.  I remember facing the changes that meant.  Certainly Nick faced significant alterations to his life, but to me his father it seemed more of an ending than a beginning.  For though I was proud of the accomplishment, and I was rooting for his future successes, I understood that my day to day involvement was ending.  My little boy, the child I had watched enter the world, learn to walk, whose hand I held as we braved the Atlantic Ocean’s waves, the boy I cheered from the stands, was becoming a man.

When we settled him into his dorm, it was more than his leaving for the first time, I understood he was never coming back…not in the way things had been…always had been…again.  Now he has lived on his own for five years.  Between time at Purdue, and his five rotations of Co-oping he has proved his ability to “live” on his own.  I am proud of that too.

It has been a difficult five years for our son.  Achieving a degree in engineering from Purdue University is not an easy task.  Learning and negotiating a way to live under the pressures of campus and classes, is a difficult education of its own.  But it has not been easy on those left behind either.  We have watched from two hours away, seen only the snippets he has shared with us.  We had worried as much about his grades as he did.  But parents worry about other things as well, about diet, about the amount of sleep he’s getting, about the friends he has.  We worry if all the “stuff” that makes up college life isn’t too much for a young man to face.  Parent’s worry.  That’s in the job description.

He’s graduating on Mother’s Day.  It is easy to see the success but not easy for us to ignore the significance.  A parent’s purpose is to prepare their child for life.  Graduations are a symbols of success in that area.  They are also a signpost of changes.  I am proud of my son…but I miss the child of my memory.  But that’s OK.  It’s a good sign that I have those special memories.  It is a good sign that I am forced to watch Nick take flight.  It is a good sign that he will soar beyond my vision.  But though his wings will take him far from me, he will never be beyond the reach of my heart.  That’s a good sign too. It is a good sign that he is capable of independence, but always knows that his mother and I will be available…to talk…and when the need arises…to help.

I know that Nick is no longer a child…that the boy that once rattled about in our home has become a man…and I am proud of the man he has become.  The man that will be moving even further away to a new career and home out of state.

Pride and tears…there is a place for both…this weekend…  As we are once more reminded that spring brings changes…

(675 Words)  5-11-2018