Michael has moved into his apartment at TCU and Paige is packing. Tomorrow Paige and I hop in the pick-up and drive her back to Iowa for her sophomore year.

Summer ends again, tonight.

I tried not to cry when she started kindergarten. She’s my youngest. For years she had watched her older brothers go off to school. Even though she went to nursery school three mornings a week, she was so ready that day she went to kindergarten. She just bounded out of the car like her brothers and headed confidently to her classroom. She was big. How could I cry?

Sunday morning, we’ll move her into a new room, although in the same dormitory as last year. She’s out of her living-learning community, but the bonds between her and fellow writers from last year are strong. They are already trying to figure out how they can find a house to share by next year.

She may not even come home next summer. I’m mindful of that. I didn’t come home after my freshman year. We’re starting to collect things she will need to live in her first home away from home.

She’s big.

How can I cry?

Sometimes we did things just to see if we could.

My grandmother’s 90th birthday was was her last.

We knew that. Her cancer was untreatable. She had been blinded by macular degeneration years ago. She sent word through the family that she wouldn’t be sending Christmas cards anymore.

It’s a big family, on my mom’s side. My mother is the oldest of nine. I’m the oldest granddaughter of, um, about sixteen, or so, I think. I haven’t met all my cousins. Many are still in Wisconsin, but not all. The great-grandchildren number more than 40, and yes, I believe there are great-great-grandchildren, too. My youngest uncle is only two years older than I am.

What can I say, except we’re a big, Catholic family.

Except about 10 years ago, Grandma let go that we weren’t always. Mom went back to meet the cousins in Northern Ireland. My great-grandfather came over from Ireland as a Presbyterian. He never sent for his family. He married my great-grandmother, shown in this photo with my grandmother.

Grandma converted to Catholicism to marry Grandpa.

My grandmother liked ham sandwiches and drank black coffee no matter what. She knew everything there was to know about babies. She was loving, but not a sentimental person nor the keeper of scores of family treasures (if there even were any).

She liked tossing out the old and in with the new. Grandma was in the moment.

But she was always stitching something. She was the first relative to show me the value of handmade gifts. One year, Grandma and Grandpa made all the granddaughters doll beds of wooden spools and cut coat hangers. They were canopy beds, and mine had pink flocking. I couldn’t believe I got the pink one. In my seven-year-old opinion, it was the prettiest of all the beds.

Whenever I visited my grandparents, which got harder and harder to do as the years went by, I would get a tour of the house to see the latest creations. It was as good as touring a folk art museum.

There were other family secrets Grandma never shared. Some we knew, but couldn’t speak of, because she wouldn’t acknowledge them. Some we learned from Aunt Bea.

Aunt Bea, the originator of the family’s sweet roll recipe, and the speaker of family secrets.

Grandma probably just found out how much her sister Bea let on. Don’t worry, Grandma. It’s all good. It’s all about the love. You knew that and so do we.

As Paige was packing up for college last summer, we had a dilemma. She’d been borrowing my jewelry box for years because she had way more bangles and beads and baubles than I did.

I stopped wearing earrings when the kids were babies and pulled on them. My skin has autism. It doesn’t like bracelets or necklaces or rings. She felt a little guilty about taking my box, especially since that left me without anything for the few things I do have.

On her dresser was a box she’d made at art camp in elementary school. It was empty. I asked her about the ceramic piece affixed to the top. Did she remember making it?

No, she said, but she did remember what inspired her. “I had learned the atmosphere was made up of bits of sunlight, and water, and the grass around us. I wanted to make that. I wanted to make the atmosphere.”

That went right to my heart. “I’ll trade you boxes,” I said. She didn’t think it was a fair trade, but I convinced her.

My little girl comes home for the holidays tonight.

Sugar and spice.

Like most kids with autism, Sam couldn’t tolerate having his hair cut when he was little. I ended up having to cut his hair in his sleep.

It worked fine when he was a toddler, although one night he kept waking up and fussing while I was trying to cut his hair, so I stopped. The next day, we went out somewhere to get some carryout and walked past a table with a couple of older men having a cup of coffee. One of the guys looked at Sam and said, “Son, you need to have a talk with your barber.”

Mark and I burst out laughing. And I told the man the job would be finished tonight, and no payment was due the barber fairy.

Eventually, our next door neighbor, who was a stylist, said she’d give it a go. We’d do it at home, putting him in the high chair and setting out a mirror. Judy would bring her supplies to the house.

It worked!

Judy was really patient. Sam was fond of telling her what to do, and Judy went along with it.

When we left California, we weren’t sure we’d find someone like Judy, but we were wrong. Connie Clark stepped right in. Her big heart and boundless sense of humor got Sam from kindergarten haircuts through middle school.

Haircuts at Connie’s became a family affair. Everyone took their turn in the chair — another thing Sam could be in charge of, who’s turn it was next to get a haircut.

We followed her over to Robson Ranch when she moved her shop from Argyle, and that old converted gas station, to a real salon. Even though most of her clients were older, we still came as a mob.

Connie got cancer and eventually she wasn’t strong enough to stand all day and cut people’s hair. Mark started taking the boys over to Unique Stylists in Denton. After Mark died, Sam kept up his appointments with Wayne. He never lets his locks get very long.

When a life is touched by autism, it touches thousands of other lives in ways you can’t imagine until you are there, watching. Connie was one of those people who helped Sam navigate to a fairly independent, normal adult life.

Just by cutting his hair.

We’ll miss you, Miss Connie.