Thomas managed both to make it to school (which is not nearly so impressive, since I drove him and dropped him off personally) and home, though the coming home was a little more dramatic. It took about an hour from the time school supposedly let out before his bus rattled onto our street and dropped him off. Speaking of rattled, that was me. I had foolishly left the number for the school back inside and didn't dare run back in to find it just in case the bus finally arrived. So I had Nate call them to find out what was going on. Apparently, it took nearly half-an-hour for the school to sort all the new little kindergartners onto the right buses and then Thomas's bus driver apparently didn't know that part of our road is closed off due to construction and got stuck trying to turn her rig around on a narrow road and come back the opposite way. When she arrived, I went running out to her, asking if she could possibly have my child on board and I was so relieved when she let him off that I thoroughly dampened him with both tears and slobbery kisses.
You know, I was wondering why I was so worried about him heading off to kindergarten when he's been going to preschool for over a year and I realized it's about autonomy. There are going to be portions of his life now where it is just him getting himself where he needs to go, and he will be facing up to kids that are older than he is in an environment that is often uncontrolled. I know this is a standard parenthood fear, but I realized yesterday that I can look and wait for him, but I can no longer actively protect him all the time.
The Hem song from the previous post would probably be more appropriate here because I realized as I was taking Thomas to school yesterday, I was carrying everything with me--my entire school experience, positive and negative--and fixating on him the weight of all these memories. I don't know. I'd be interested in hearing how other parents handled their kids-off-to-school fears and how the kids themselves succesfully navigated their newfound autonomy in a new world that is more peers than family.
2 comments:
I think when you set their feet on the right path, they often manage to find there way will only a few bumps and bruises along the way.
Keep talking to him. Make it a habit now, so that when the tough stuff starts to happen he will talk to you then too.
I suck at letting go. But the kids are really good at going...so you gotta go along.
You're doing great so far!
Mara I think you expressed well our worries. Suddenly we are letting them out of our sphere of control where, in our mind's eye, anything can happen to them because we are not with them. The older kids can now bully him if the teacher is busy with the other children, he won't eat his food, he could say something outrageous, the list goes on. I don't know if that is exactly how you feel about Thomas, but I know it is how I feel about Roscoe.
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