Confession Saturday: Back to School Edition

I confess:

~The school year routine is kicking my butt.  Our boys get on the bus a few minutes before seven a.m.  This makes for very early mornings for the Mom Trying to Write.  NB: The school bus schedule cuts right into my best time for writing.

~And yet, I love the school bus and consider it one of the best examples of how far we have come as a species.  From ooga-booga cave people to a long, yellow machine that appears at the end of my driveway twice daily: once to whisk away the children, and once to discharge them back into my open arms.

~My use of the word "routine" above is inaccurate.  Routine as in a sequence of actions regularly followed; routine as in a fixed, unvarying programme.  Whatever school-year routine this family eventually falls into has not yet coalesced.  We are stumbling along, and so far everyone has arrived at their intended destination on time, and with their lunches.  This is about all I can manage so far.

~Preschool just really doesn't last that long.  9:00 to 11:30.  Long enough to make you think you'll have a little time to do a little something.  Next thing you know you're racing back over there for pick-up.  And yet, I confess, I have really enjoyed going to the bathroom all by myself with no one pounding on the door, calling my name.

~I have already caved on my resolution to make the boys pack their own lunches every night.  By the time dinner dishes are done, I'm too tired to even contemplate opening that can of worms.  And they'd have to get up at 5:30 to do it in the morning.  For now, I'm letting it be enough that they pack Monday's lunch on Sunday evening.  Amen.

~I have the ugliest shoes of any of the mommies at school.  I accept this about myself.  Amen, again.

~I confess, I appear at school just often enough to check out everyone's shoes and to appear "involved" (as in experiencing or participating in an activity) but not often enough that people think of me when they need a volunteer for something.

~I am dreading -- as in anticipating with great apprehension or fear -- the start of first grade homework this week.  Although AJ is sometimes quite irresistible, he is not always so.  And he comes home from school so tired I can barely squeeze hanging up the backpack out of him.  Even that task can reduce him to a puddle of tears.  Who is the patron saint of homework?  I will be on my knees praying as the spelling words and math "home-links" (I confess, I hate that word) start coming home on Monday.

~I confess, despite the early mornings, despite the disruption of my writing time, despite the brevity of preschool and the dread of first grade homework, I never forget how lucky and privileged we are in this country to have access to free, public education.  I am, every day, grateful for the awesome -- as in, informal: excellent -- schools my kids attend.  Amen, amen, amen.

(Photo is public domain from wikimedia commons; all definitions from OED).