Growing Pains

Tonight I'm doing the "mom thing" -- sitting on pins and needles. My oldest daughter, Shellynne, left this afternoon for Tokyo. She's been overseas before, but with a group, and this time she's flying alone and will be gone for 4 months, studying in Japan. I was just as bad when she went to China. I know I won't be able to relax until I get that email from her saying that she has safely arrived in her dorm. That should be around 6 or 7 tomorrow morning -- right now she's somewhere over the Aleutians. Yeah, I'm worried. Yeah, I'm missing her already. She'll always be my baby.