On Saturday, my husband and I drove a long 135 miles home after delivering our daughter to college.

I had approached the day with great joy and anticipation all summer long. She is attending my alma mater, Clemson University, and I know her experience there will be wonderful. I could not be more thrilled for her.

So I was gobsmacked when 10 miles after driving away—after taking her sweet face in my hands, looking in her eyes and saying, one more time—i am so excited for you—the tears started to fall. And I haven’t been able to control them since.

As if prescribed by fate, my husband is traveling. So I came home from work today to a very empty house. In my former life (prior to yesterday), an evening alone was reason to rejoice. Popcorn for dinner; back to back to back Oprah; staying up way past the 10pm cutoff just because it’s all up to me. But tonight was different, the first of thousands to come. And so I gathered the will to fix dinner, then to sit alone at the kitchen table to eat.

It was far from the most enjoyable meal of my life. But I made it through. And that, I believe, is reason enough to mark it.