First Parents Bracing For College Goodbye
The leader of the Free World woke up Wednesday with a severe case of Anxious Dad Syndrome.
“The first thing I did this morning was go look at the boxes and make sure we had all the right things in the right boxes,” President Clinton told reporters as he prepared to ship the First Daughter to college today.
They’re the boxes Chelsea Clinton will take with her as she and her parents head off to Stanford University.
Friday, the White House officially will become an empty nest as the 17-year-old Chelsea moves into a dorm on the palm-shaded California campus.
Clinton, who has occupied the Arkansas governor’s mansion and the White House for most of his daughter’s life, joked that it will be one of the rare times she “hasn’t lived in public housing.”
Chelsea, whose parents took her and some friends out to her favorite Washington restaurant - an Indian eatery - earlier in the week, devoted her last evening in the White House to packing, with dad’s help.
“They’re going to have to probably negotiate over certain CDs later this evening,” presidential press secretary Mike McCurry speculated.
The president wasn’t hiding his feelings. “I’m happy and sad at the same time,” he said. “That’s what you raise them for.”
Chafed by a reporter’s question on whether the president or first lady gave Chelsea any warning about “college boys,” McCurry fired one final warning at the press corps: “One of the reasons why she’s turned out to be a remarkably fine young lady is that we haven’t pried too much in details like that. And I certainly hope that will be the fashion in which her life continues to be reported.”
First lady Hillary Clinton made a heartfelt plea in her weekly newspaper column for the media to continue to respect Chelsea’s privacy. She also confessed that she is “dreading the moment Bill and I have to say goodbye” - probably Friday evening.
Hillary Clinton also wrote that they have been “fighting back tears” as they contemplated their daughter’s departure for her new life.