Week 1: I Don't Wanna Go To School (Says MAMA!)

LABOR DAY, Monday, September 1, 2008. 6pm. The kitchen.

Despite the fact that I have a checklist in front of me that has everything on it checked off, the pile of school supplies Mac is to take to his first day of 2nd grade tomorrow is short one set of markers and one box of wipes. There are no more wipes hiding under Sailor’s bed and the markers I thought we had leftover from gosh-knows-what are not in my closet. “Send a note to the teacher,” my sister suggests. But I have no excuse. The supplies list came home with Mac in June on his last torturous day of 1st grade. I have had a full 11 weeks to fill the requirements of this list.

Second grade has to be better than first. It has to be! Regardless, I don’t really plan to have Mac return next year. Unless we have truly amazing year. Truly amazing.

A few weeks ago my college best friend called me in tears over her little one starting 1st grade. Full of sympathy and knowing it would be my turn soon I listened and advised. Today I want to call her. But it is Labor Day, a holiday and I know she is doing family stuff. I try my dad, who pats my shoulder and says simply, “He has to go.” I try my sister, who gives me, “Don’t let him hear you.” It’s not as if Mac wants to go to school tomorrow. Before he falls asleep he says, “I don’t want to leave you tomorrow. Can’t I go next week.” I am a good mom, so I tell him simply that no, he can’t start next week, school starts tomorrow.

I have sand in my hair and my boys and I have sunburned faces. They aren’t terribly burned so I don’t mind saying they look adorable. We spent the day at the beach. It was like being on a fabulous vacation at a crazy busy resort, thousands of people, bikinis, Frisbees. It was fantastic. A perfect end to a really great summer.

Mac’s backpack weighs a ton. His change of clothes, requested for the 1st time since preschool, is packed. The old lunchbox has been dug out and a new “Happy 1st day of 2nd grade” note is placed inside. Mac’s clothes are picked out. Sailor’s soccer uniform is laid out. We are ready to go. And I don’t want to.

I don’t want to be the fun, friendly mom this year. I was rejected as a room parent for the 2nd year in a row. And I want take a silent pill so I can appear withdrawn and unfriendly this year. Why not? I don’t want to be part of the community of parents this year. And yet I am sitting in bed, doing my nails and my outfit is picked out…

I email my college best friend:

I so do not want to take Mac to school tomorrow! He doesn't want to go either. He doesn't want to be away from us. Oh gosh! I so wish I had done more than just fantasized about alternatives for him for this year. His clothes are picked out and his backpack weighs a TON! And we had to run to CVS at 6:00 tonight to buy markers and wipes because even tho I had 11 weeks to buy this stuff, and even tho both items were checked off my list, I didn't have either thing. Have I mentioned that I don't want to take Mac to school tomorrow? We have had such a nice summer. This is our real life, the warm weather and the togetherness. Funny how when I had Mac I had no idea what I would do with a baby -- I wanted a kid! Now that I have a kid, kids, I just want them to stay little so I can keep them close.

sigh...

I made plans for a busy day tomorrow. Hopefully Mac will have fun at school. I don't plan to have him go back there next year tho.

Wish me luck in the a.m.!
We had an impromptu falalfel fest/party on the porch last night and we didn't come in til almost 10! It was so much fun!
Love, SuperMommy


I don’t sleep a wink Sunday between my kids thinking I am the bed and not the mom sandwiched between them, and my anxiety over our summer together being at an abrupt end. It is hot. I am awake and out of bed before the alarm. Not even tired. Mac has been moaning and rolling around. “My stomach hurts.” Great. I can see it now: We’re calling in sick on the first day of school.

I come to realize that when you have children, no event is mutually exclusive. Normally, for me, a first day of school would be just that and only that with all focus on that. But not today. Today is also Sailor’s first day back to soccer. It is also the day my father has scheduled the plumber to come install the new vanity and bathroom sink. What time, Dad? 8:30 a.m.? You mean precisely the time I need to be hustling my boys out the door for Mac’s traditional on-the-front-stairs first day of school photo shoot? Precisely. And please take the vanity and sink out of their respective boxes so the plumber doesn’t have to waste time doing it? Alrighty then. So at 8:00 a.m. when the boys are supposed to be finishing up their breakfasts fit for little kings and I am meant to be drying my hair, we are taking knife to cardboard and mutilating the boxes surrounding these long-awaited, and very heavy bathroom accessories.

Outside I take a few photos as my parents come out to wish us well. My mom’s best friend comes by to walk to school to wish her granddaughter well in 1st grade, and an old neighbor with whom we have never been friends happily crosses the street so that her kindergartener can walk to school with us. We are an odd groupto be sure, walking down the sunny street. And why is it hotter this morning than it has been in a month? In fact the hottest day on record this year!? Because I have dressed my 2nd grader in a sweater vest and because the beach and all the neighborhood pools are officially closed, that’s why. I realize halfway to school that I am talking more to the adults and not paying much attention to my bespectacled red-head to whom I am about to bid a 6 ½ hour farewell.

The scene outside school is one of utter chaos. As always. Working parents drop off their accustomed children. New parents hover near their timid children. I stick close to mine because he is the only person here I want to talk to. He heaves his 50 pound backpack on his back and does not complain that he has to carry his lunch box and an extra bag of supplies and a change of clothes. I overhear his conversation with a girl named Chloe, whom I do not know. “We went to Paris, and London, and … “ she names off the countries in Europe the way Mac could name off the museums we visited last week. Undeterred Mac enthusiastically responds with, “We went to Kenosha [Wisconsin; called, by Sailor, Misconsin]. Twice!”

Cameras click. Camcorders silently record these precious moments. Behind my giant black sunglasses I conceal the tears that try in vain to spring from my eyes. I don’t cry for one simple reason: If I do cry, I will be a sobbing, hysterical mess, and no one would care! I avoid eye contact with all but a new mom, whom I welcome graciously, and a mom whom I became friends with last year but whom I have not seen since June.

The bell rings. The children go inside (Mommy complaint #1, which I share with no one: The 2nd grade teachers couldn’t haul their asses downstairs and come get their kids on the first day?! Seriously?!). And that is that.

Sailor and I walk home. He has soccer at 9:30.

Or so I have written in my schedule book from now until the end of November. Apparently he actually has soccer at 10:30. And I have chocolate ice cream on the hem of my dress, which I thought was still clean after only having worn it a few hours after the beach yesterday.

At Old Navy I buy myself a new sundress -- which fits fabulously and adorably in the dressing room, but is way too big once I try to carry my purse on my shoulder, pick up Sailor, sit or move once I leave the store – and a pair of jeans for Mac.

There are two children in Sailor’s soccer class. He doesn’t want me to go to the bathroom to put on the sundress until his class is over. And when it is and he sees I have changed dresses, he is pissed! “I had to go pee! So I figured I might as well change my dress while I was there,” I explain and he is placated.

At Trader Joe’s they have everything pre-made for a fabulous falafel dinner. Except falafel. Off to Whole Foods. Then the bank. Then home to put groceries away.

Then to lunch with my dad, which is not as much fun as usual because he can’t eat anything with fat in it and has no idea what to order. And Sailor refuses to eat. And the waiter is grumpy. And my dad can’t hear me over the traffic. And he insists that no matter what happens at school Mac will survive. I don’t know how to make everyone understand that it’s not just survival that I want for my children.

Sailor plays in the playground with the 6th grade gym class while we wait for Mac to come out of school. We have kept miraculously busy this day so it has flown by. Nonetheless we miss Mac.

He comes out and true to form a smile spreads across his face when he sees me. “How was it?” I hold my breath in anticipation of his answer.
“Second grade is awesome!”
And that is all I need to hear.

He tells me who he is sitting next to (his locker partner from last year) and who is locker partner is (Isabella A.) and who he had lunch with (John) and that his class has AC and he that he was cold. He tells me his teacher is nice and had a nice voice and that she gave them pretzels this afternoon while they were writing stories about what they did this summer and that he wrote his about the Renaissance Faire we went to on Saturday and that his teacher said to spell their words the way they think they should be spelled and not to worry if they didn’t know the right way. His teacher, Mrs. W., looked happy when she dismissed the class.

We take Mac to Orange Julius for a treat, but he wants ice cream, which I won’t let him have there. We wait 15 minutes for Alec's Orange Julius. After we stop home for a moment we leave for an ice cram place only to find – or not find, as the case may be – my wallet. We walk home, grab ice cream sandwiches from the freezer and spend the rest of the afternoon at the playground.

For dinner we are having falafel. I set the falafel mix in a bowl with 1 ¼ cups of water and check the clock to see what time it will be in 15 minutes. Enough time for me to clean the front steps from Sunday night’s falafel fest. Which I am obligated to clean because my mother, whose house this is, says I have to clean it. “Your sister bought the food. I cooked it. Now you clean up the mess.” I drizzle my organic all natural enviro-friendly dish soap down the stairs and set the hose to power wash, which is a joke. Knowing full well that no matter how I proceed, it won’t be done right. There will be soap residue or the mats won’t be clean enuf or I won’t have re-wound the hose properly or I will have left too much water standing in the drain or … I am soaked up to my knees when the distant cry of a small child reminds me that I did not let mine know I was going outside.

Dinner is a hit. But only after Sailor finishes a tantrum of disappointment over the fact that I did not make the spicy green things (pesto tortellini) that we picked up at Trader Joe’s this afternoon. I am extremely calm when I explain to him that this is what we have planned for dinner tonight and this is what we are eating and while, no, he does not have to eat it, no, he may not have something else. Mac eats three falafel sandwiches. Sailor eats almost 2. “It’s yummy. It’s just not what I wanted.” A mature statement from my nearly-5-year-old. I can deal with that. We decide that I am not clearing the table after dinner anymore and that we will let whoever’s day it is to go first do it. Being an even day (today is September 2) it is Sailor’s day. He does not like the new plan. But he goes along with it, somewhat grudgingly and I ignore his mutterings. When we are all done (yes, of course I help him out) I lean down close and tell him, “Thank you for your help. I really appreciate it.” He hugs and kisses me and says a very kind, “You’re welcome. And sorry for not wanting to.”

By bed time I remember why we have had various charts up around the house at various times and see that I need to make one for brushing teeth, one for cleaning up the dishes, one for picking up toys. And, I am sure in a day or so, one for doing homework.

In bed Mac asks me what will happen if 2nd grade gets really bad in the middle or the end. He tells me he does not want to go back to his school for 3rd grade. I tell him to let me worry about these things.

And so our – our­ -- first day of 2nd grade ends.


Day 2: My boys eat breakfast and I make lunches. “Mac,” I ask, “what would you like in your thermos today?”
“What – I have to g oto school again?”

And so it goes.

It is roughly 25 degrees cooler this morning than it was yesterday morning, but we are ill prepared and have no jackets. In the time it takes Mac to do whatever it is that 2nd graders do on the 2nd day of 2nd grade, Sailor and I stop at Starbucks, swing by the Alderman’s office to recycle batteries and pick up free light bulbs, Sailor has a 2-hour class at the enrichment program Mac attended for 2 years while I sit in the lobby and read during (“I’ll know if you leave, Mom!”), spend $71 on jeans and sweatshirts at TJMaxx because we are freezing, have lunch and a lunch meeting, read stories at Borders, try to return a defective schedule book at Barnes & Noble (I mean really, who designs a schedule book whose pages start on Thursday?!), pay a bill at Home Depot, stop at Starbucks again … and then we are back for Mac. Sailor is asleep. Beside him in the stroller is a book/box set of a racecar kit. This wins the admiration and curiosity of many little brothers waiting with us. And when Mac walks down the stairs his eye goes right to this toy/book. “Whad’ja get for me?”

I ask him how school was today.
“Awesome, just like yesterday.”

I have managed to avert my eyes and converse with only one other mom today.

We walk to Mac’s first piano lesson. “Isabella and I can go upstairs together,” he tells me, leaving me, and Isabella’s mom in awe of our suddenly grown-up children. But a moment later they return. “We can’t find room 9.”
I escort them back upstairs.
But a moment later they return.
“I don’t want to go in there by myself.”

An hour later Mac comes downstairs, a huge grin on his face. “That was such great fun!”

Mac wants me to fill out the form for him to get hot lunch. I am glad that he has forgotten whatever turned him off of hot lunches last year – it’s a nice alternative once in awhile. For him and for me.

Both boys are exhausted, as is their mommy. Ah, school…!

Thursday night we have French class. I sneak out to Whole Foods white the boys are in class. No one seems to notice the bag of groceries when I carry it in later at home. After dinner we sit down to do homework. Mac just has to fill in 6 answrs in the front of his agenda book. Sailor works on soem workbook pages with me. It takes Mac nearly an hour to write his six words. I must remember to buy a timer. Homework is meant to take no longer than 3o minutes and I tell him I am not about to do this with him again this year. Homework is to be done. Period.

By the time we get to the end of the first week of school we are, understandably, exhausted. I wake in the dark Friday morning before the 6:00 alarm and think to myself that I do not have to be anywhere today. And then instantly remember that I do indeed have to get Mac to school. But before this is to occur I have to drop Sailor downstairs and drive with Mac to the car repair shop owned by the parents of one of his classmates. We must get the “check engine” light checked and turned off before we drive out to the suburbs for a picnic tomorrow morning – a trip that will entail a 20-minute walk back to the repair shop at 9a.m. Saturday, an 8-minute negotiation for a discount, an 8-minute drive back home and a 5-minute contemplation as to how I might pay the credit card bill I just charged for $555 to have my 12-year-old vehicle released into my posession. Mac and I walk to school and I wait outside with him. Hugging him in a moment when he looks miserable. I escort a friend’s crying little girl into kindergarten (she is a moment late and does not know where to go because the kindergarten door is closed), I sit thru a miserably long PTA meeting and have my name called out one too many times as the lauded editor of the PTA newsletter (and want to remind them all that I was not good enough to be chosen as a room parent for the 2nd year in a row). I keep to myself, don’t look the principal in the eye when he addresses us, make a note to bring him a diet Coke rather than a cupcake on Mac’s birthday in May (after he tells us he is diabetic). I spend the afternoon doing workbook pages and cleaning the playroom with Sailor. When it is time to pick up Mac we go instead to play with Sailor’s friends, the twins, who like all the rest of Sailor’s friends, are in kindergarten without him this year. At the twins’ house I drink tea with their mother as I did all last winter and realize that while in my heart the summer in my real life – warm weather and my children about me – in fact the school year has already taken over and winter will become my unwelcome real life soon enough.

Mac has a date after school with Aunt Mimi. But I do not like this – not picking him up myself. So when 5:30 comes and we turn the corner to our home I am crushed to find that his father has gotten to our house first and has Mac on his back. Mac climbs down and comes to me. And I am well.

I am confused as to what day it is and I don’t feel as if only 5 days ago we were enjoying a hot day at the beach and ice cream on the porch.

I send out an email letting our friends know that we are on the road to a successful school year, and that our misery of last year looks as if it won’t be repeating itself.

We spend our weekend pretending that it is still summer. But nothing feels the same. And it is not hot outside. And I feel pressure to do something with my boys (besides watching an Andy Gibb special on tv). And the ice cream after dinner does not taste the same because my feet are cold and we are eating it indoors.

Another very busy week lies ahead. I don’t want to wish my time away until the next summer comes about. But it is so dreadfully hard to part with my child each day, knowing that the mere fact of school will continue to change him, for better and for worse, and that I have no control over this.

On Sunday night, before he falls asleep, Mac tells me I should not wake up early. Because he might be sick and might need to stay home from school. 39 weeks to go!