A week later, in another hotel room, I type this. This time I am the one away from home. On Saturday, my son graduates from college.

“An ending,” I said on the phone a few weeks back, “and a new beginning.”

“No, it’s not,” was the only reply that he gave.

As the president of the college TV station, he’s always had a part to play at this event. The director role, that’s the part he likes this year as well.

My son is busy organizing and planning other kids’ graduation. I’ve just come to realize that’s his way of not saying good-bye.

Saying good-bye doesn’t have to be melancholy. Sometimes saying good-bye is the only way we realize how meaningful something has been.

I wrote right before I graduated from college.

That’s the way of new beginnings . . . they all seem to start from saying good-bye.