Spring Fever

Only one more week of school...only one more week of school...only ONE MORE WEEK! I CAN DO THIS! I CAN wake up for just a few more days at the dawn of the sunrise and scream to the top of my lungs, shouting out orders (that are the EXACT same damn thing I've said every flippin' morning since Drama Mama started kindergarten) for forty five minutes until the last child is dropped off and both me and Vannie Mae (yes, my van has a name) heave a sigh of relief,that is,until it's time to pick them up again. Oh GAWD, how I HATE everything that has to do with this process. I know it makes me sound like a terrible mother but it's true. If it were up to me, we'd just run off with a travelling carnival and they would soak up the Theatre of Life and read books that I chose for them and we'd all live happily and peculiarly ever-after.

Ok, maybe not that extreme, but pretty close. The only thing that keeps me from home-schooling them is,well, I'd like to keep the hair I have left and home-schooled children creep me out. They all seem to be so excited to speak to anyone that's not their mother that they stare at you with wide-eyed wonder and poke you with sticks because they've never seen a live specimen of the "dirty people" that go for days without using hand sanitizer and have names that are actual first names, not obscure trendy monikers that end in '-on'. ( you know, Hudson,Carson,Grayson etc..)
I know this because I worked a very short stint as a manager at our local Chuck E. Cheese's and every month or so, the Regional Home School Mom Cult would come in with their quilted purses and Earth Shoes, Stepford children in tow and order everything on the menu that had no grease and no flavor and force their children to pretend that they know how to socialize with one another. The kids spent most of the day asking me if my children were allowed to have candy because they had heard it was edible but were skeptical.
So, being a carnie and home schooling aside, my only option is to pack them up and ship them out daily to the public schools to which we have been erroniously assigned to. ( I say it is in error because when we lived in Nowheretown, they went to Smallburg Elmentary, when we moved and got a Smallburg address, we were suddenly in the Littleville school district. It makes no sense..but I digress..) So, I put on a brave face and fuss through the dressing ritual which starts out as me,nicely asking them to dress and groom themselves and then it proceeds to me sternly suggesting, then demanding, then screaming, then pleading, begging and,finally, me turning into a slobbering nut trying explain the concept of time and having a sense of urgency to a six year old boy who has no qualms whatsoever about running around ALL day with boogers hanging out of his nose.

So, now that THAT mess is over with, let's talk about "Whose Mom Loves Them Most Day". This is the day of the year that the children are to report to school dressed as their hero, favorite book character, an 18th century concubine peasant girl, a Model T car, a twelve string guitar eating guacamole, or what they want to be when they grow up.Do I look like a costume designer with a blockbuster budget? For goddsake, can't we just concentrate on cursive? I'll by you all the wide ruled paper that you want but please don't make me sew eight million buttons onto a a piece of felt!
Ultimately, I cuss and improvise my way through these days and make a doable costume out of stuff around the house only to have which ever kid it is turn around and point to the little jerk getting out of his mom's gas guzzling urban assault vehicle wearing a spandex tomato plant costume that grows real tomatoes. Then I am forced to leave them picking their pride off of the pavement as they trudge into class. Damnit, I love my kids more because I am teaching them to have an imagination! Right? RIGHT?

And then there's the papers. Gawd almighty at the papers these kids bring home! You would think that in this internet age, they would just save the paper and send their test scores, memos, invites to conferences and reminders about 'whose mom loves them more day' by email. But no. They don't. They make me put my signature on anything that used to be a tree, every freaking night. This is annoying enough for one kid,I'm sure but I have a house full of children which means a stack full of papers. I had to take a muscle relaxer after orientation day this year because the student info packet for each kid is nothing short of a Stephen King novel.

And now that it is the very tail end of the year, the papers that are coming are even more plentiful because we're not only getting memos for the impossibly full schedule of band concerts, field days,field trips, beach days (because that is so practical and relevant), spring carnivals, bake sales, end of the year conferences, exams, awards days, class parties and the last opportunity for the PTO to bleed you dry, they are also sending home all of the wonderful little pieces of genius that your child has worked on all year. I love seeing this stuff but I'm never sure what I'm supposed to do with all of it-I filled up an entire moving box with these things, just today. And you can't throw it away, it's their ART WORK, MOM!
That's why the damn teachers send it home, again proving that I DO NOT love them more because I don't have a big enough fridge to hold their entire portfolio until the end of time.

If any of you up-and-coming mommies are wondering if I am exaggerating, just call up my good friend Binyah-Secretary Extraordinaire of the Booster Club

She'll school ya.( but she may ask you for a donation first.)

Don't ever let anyone tell you that public education is free.The biggest cost however, may be your sanity.