After my mother, I'm the one doing the grocery shopping. Usually, this is only when it's just my dad's home that night, and my brother and I are tired of eating frozen pizza for dinner. Among the aisles of pasta and Tide spot removal to get the pizza sauce stain out of the rug before mom comes home, there are always one or two mothers toting more kids than they can carry, yelling for her children to stay close, behave and not run off.

In those moments, I think about much happier everyone in that situation would be if that mother would let go — let her kids roam to the end of the aisle or do a cartwheel in the middle of the store because they can. Because they're children. Because they're supposed to accidentally almost run into people playing tag and because they're supposed to learn how to apologize on their own. Because they're supposed to be proud of their accomplishments. Because being on your best behavior doesn't mean that, at 5 years old, you must act like a grown-up. Some of my fondest memories in those grocery stores have been being run into by a goofy, wide-eyed, freckled thing with a huge smile, muttering a quick "sorry" before running into their next slipper-wearing victim. A child's joy always brings a smile, and I promised myself I would be the mother who would let their child roam free someday.

Coming back from college, I had to reevaluate my promise to my future munchkins.

I came home to a souped-up, 2009, bright orange Dodge Challenger in the possession of my soon-to-be 16 year old baby brother. Staring at the steel lump of metal in our garage for the first time, my immediate thought was: "Absolutely not. You all must be out of your mind if you think for two seconds that I am going to let Drew drive this." This was my little brother, getting ready to hit the roads in a low-lying, neon death machine. Yeah, I don't think so. Not a chance.

All I want is to wrap him in bubble wrap and send him out the door with multiple helmets and pillows duct taped to the many layers of bubble wrap. I want to hold him and protect him and make sure nothing bad ever happens to him, replacing that sad excuse of a car that had zero form of protection with a giant army tank. I want to not let go, like the weary-eyed mothers in the grocery store.

But that's not what makes him happy.

What makes him happy is the fact that he now knows how to drive a manual car. What makes him happy is that this car, any teen's first taste of real freedom, completely exhibits him and his nature. He is his own, and he will do what he wants to do — driving an old rock-and-roll type of car the color of his favorite university and listening to music that my late great-grandfather probably listened to when he was Drew's age, because he is his own person, and I cannot change that.

I am really awful at letting go. I see that now when I hadn't seen it before.

I don't want to do it, and I don't want to think about everything that could possibly happen if I allow myself to let go. But no day on earth is guaranteed. No way of life is guaranteed, and no second step is a given. I want to be like the mom in the grocery store who let her children run into my leg because she realized that her child was old enough to start making their own mistakes. I want my everyday life to exhibit that — to show that my family, my loved ones, my best friends and my sweet little brother have a life all to their own and that they are completely and fully in control. I want to trust that each day comes with a plan, and there is nothing I can do to change what has been written into existence.

All I can do is let go and watch the goofy faces run into legs at the grocery stores — all on their own.