Bookguy and I shared a ski lift with two older men. We struck up a conversation as people do on the leisurely ascents up a ski hill. They mentioned they were from Oklahoma. We said we had been through there once. To this, one of the guys said:

If you are ever told you just have just one year left to live, you should move to Oklahoma.

Really? Why’s that?

Because a year in Oklahoma feels like a lifetime.

This is how Marty and I feel about our first year of having all adult children. If polled, neither of us would have said we had any great expectations, but we have learned we might have had some expectations. We are like four minutes into this new life chapter, and to say it is a different sort of game would be like saying I am only slightly awkward at party small talk.

Before having kids and while my kids were young, I knew how ill-eqiupped I was for parenthood and therefore perptually scanned the horizon for people who looked like they had some sense about it. When I saw a parent, and certainly a father, who looked competent, I descended upon them and began my inquisition. Few were prepared for the number and nature of questions I leveled at them. It was through this ambush technique I accumalated nearly all my paternal wisdom.

Perhaps it was an oversight but I didn't expect to have to do something similar when my children left the home. Well, that's not entirely true. I knew there were marital matters for Marty and I to work through and we've been doing our discovery there by talking to older couples who have survived that stretch of desert and we feel reasonably prepared—though we still have to make the trek.

In our research, we have run into an undeniable theme. It is this: unsolicited advice is received as criticism. This likely applies to more than just adult children, but it definitely applies to adult children. Watching people younger than you do things you’ve done in the past and not comment is almost as challenging as watching someone cook pasta without a timer.

A friend of ours with two older boys received similar counsel. After a number of terse conversations with one of her adult children, she asked a friend for help. This friend had fabulous relationships with not just one but two grown children. When asked about her secret, the woman said, “But did they ask?” She went on to say that your job is to say nothing until you are asked to weigh in. Our friend liked this so much she wrote it on a card and hung it on the fridge as a show of her commitment to this newfound philosophy. Months later while in another heavy conversation with her youngest, the boy pointed at the card on the fridge and said, “But Mom, did I ask?”

Some will feel that I should document this learning experience just as I shared my journey of becoming a parent. While I see the logic of this, the difference is, the experiences of my adult children are not my story to tell. Nor do I feel capable of telling them. When you have young kids, they are with you all the time and in many ways you, the parent, know them better than they know themselves. This is what puts you in a prime position to serve as the home's journalist. It is not the same with adult children. We are not with them all the time. We do not know them better than they know themselves. Nor do we understand the worries and challenges they are confronting because they are different than the worries and challenges we faced at their age.

So this is why I'm finally putting the pen down. I have told my story as well as my family story. Now it is time for my children, my adult children, to tell theirs.