The very words fill me with dread.

This month high school seniors clad in caps and gowns walk across stages.

And afterwards, they take off for their first flight of freedom: Beach Week.

The scene hurtles me back to a buried memory.

It was June, eighteen years ago.  The morning after Jacob’s graduation I smiled and waved him off as he and a long-haired friend tossed backpacks into a beat-up pickup truck and headed for North Carolina. I had no idea what awaited.

High school graduates still flock to three-story mansions along the outer banks of North Carolina.  It’s their final summer fling before summer jobs and colleges anchor them again.

Now it is my grandson’s turn to visit the same seashore where his uncle did a lifetime ago.  Some sixteen fellow graduates gather.  All are from “good” families.  All have futures meticulously planned.

As it was for my son.

That week for Jacob should have been sun-kissed and carefree.  Instead, his darkening addiction cast an ominous shadow over that stay, robbing him – like so much else during those years – of that rite of passage.

So is it any wonder that I found myself whispering a warning to the new graduate?  A few words before he drove off with friends for Beach Week?

“Be careful,” I say as I held him close.  “Have fun. Be careful, please.  I love you.”

The rest of us – parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles – are left to wonder and pray that the week goes well.

But perhaps no one is prouder of him or happier for this week of rightfully earned freedom than Jacob.

Because after more than fourteen years in recovery for him – and fifteen for me – we both can celebrate Beach Week – maybe for the first time.