One… more… time

Since 1982 I have been doing the “back to school” thing- yes, for 32 years. At first it was exciting. As a parent of young children, back then, it was fun and scary to see them go off to their first day. I used to take first day of school photos of the kids all dressed in their new clothes. I would bake them a special cake or surprise to celebrate. Each year we’d head to Target or Walmart to buy all those school year supplies.

As time went on, I began to dread school. My 3 boys were not the best students. Their grades did not reflect their abilities, and keeping track of what they needed to do, when they tried their best to hide it from me, was a full time job. Helping with homework was a daily nightmare as well. My husband worked shift work and was no help. While I made supper (after a day at my job), I juggled keeping the baby quiet while answering math questions.
I attended the teacher conferences, and ran the kids back and forth to all their extracurricular activities. I picked them up from the buss stop, and got up early to see them off each day. I lost time at work when they stayed home sick, and sat at all their practices for whatever sport they played.

My children are spaced out in age so when my first son was in elementary school, I had a baby. When those two were in school, I had a baby girl. And when my daughter was in 5th grade, one son was in middle school and the other one had already flunked out of high school. (He went on to get his GED and is now a very successful man). Guess what? I had another baby. This one was not at all planned, and so I began again. When I discovered that I was pregnant the most depressing thought was doing school all over again! In 2003 he had his first day of school, and boy was I over it.

Now my youngest son is starting his junior year of high school. Two years to go. I am not involved with the school. In fact I have as little as possible to do with any of it. I try to keep my son on track and spout the benefits of good grades to deaf ears. I’m used to it. I know that he can still do fine in life even with bad grades. There are more important things.

So here we go again. Yay.