I once had to drop my niece off at school. We were halfway down the block when she let me know she wasn’t wearing shoes. When we arrived at her school (with her shoes now on thank you very much), I was thrown into the savage world of school drop off lines and decided to just park down the street and walk in with her. I was then mortified when her teacher had to be called from eating her lunch to come and retrieve her from the office because we were so early. That awkward situation has hung over me for years, so I vowed to myself that now that I’m a mom, instead of just the inept auntie, I was going to get this right on the first try. I got to school 20 minutes early. I had my map of the two block drop off route clutched in my hands and practiced the route. I was somehow not ridiculously late. I had this.
We parked down the street and walked up to take a picture in front of the sign for the school and visit the chickens. Yes. That’s a thing there and it’s legitimately the reason we (she) picked this school over the less expensive preschool that’s closer to our house (which tells you how seriously we take major life choices in our home). We took our photo as the drop off line started to queue and I was feeling confident. I decided since it was her first day and I had to drop a document off, we would grab the document out of the car and walk in to her school together for her first day! When I arrived, I was greeted by five staff members…three of which looked somewhat alarmed by our presence and two that were just better at faking it. I explained that I had a document to drop off and handed it over to what could have been the janitor. Then asked if it was ok if I walked Ellie to her room. They politely informed me that the school didn’t open for 10 more minutes. You guys. They know my secret about how excited I was to get rid of my kid by dropping her off before the lights were even on in the whole building.
After heading back outside to laugh and shake off the fact that I again fumbled acting like I knew what I was doing when dropping a child off at school, I waited the 10 minutes (8.5 if I’m being honest because I had a shower to take) and headed back in. I breezed right by the office (with my head down and my face covered) and escorted my kiddo to her room. Her lovely teacher greeted us and helped Ellie change into her adorable little Montessori slippers. Ellie would not stop talking about the dragon (which I feel the need to break down for you…her classroom pet is a bearded dragon. We watched Pete’s Dragon in between the time she learned this a few weeks ago (without seeing said bearded dragon at school) and the start of school. During that time she has created a VERY elaborate mental picture of the classroom dragon. She was pretty confident that if she had a bad day at school she could ride on the dragon’s back to get away. We had assured her at each moment that she shared news about this mental dragon picture she was creating that it was a small lizard. We learned over the last few weeks that we as parents aren’t great at setting proper expectations for her.) I did not explain that to her teacher because I knew if I said more than three words I would cry.
The teacher spent the 3 minutes it took for her to take off her shoes and put on her slippers (I timed it) that they would visit the dragon when she was done changing her shoes. I was impressed by the teacher’s patience and knew they would get along just fine (because I’ve had to develop the patience of whatever is more patient than a saint over the last three and a half years and I recognized those characteristics in her teacher for not ripping the shoe out of her hand and shoving it on her foot). At the point Ellie stood up and grabbed her teacher’s hand her teacher looked over at me and said, “And how are you doing today? I know this is a big day for you too” I said, “Great! I’m going to the gym.” Because had I said, “I’m going to take a real fucking shower.” I probably wouldn’t be invited to do all of the things I volunteered for at Parent Orientation (just my excuse to maintain my status as a helicopter mom and spy on the inner workings of her classroom). Since I said I was going to the gym, I made a detour en route to my shower and did actually go run three miles at the gym (that’s me patting myself on the back in front of all of you and isn’t really that relevant to the story. Just FYI).
After taking what was honestly just a normal shower, I went to jump back in my car and realized her teacher would see what can only be described as a permanent residence for a family of five on wheels. There are three of us in our family..it’s a sore subject, see previous blog post (I’m new at this and don’t know how to insert a cry laugh emoji, so just take a moment to picture that here). So, I did what any normal human being that likes to pretend they have their life together would do in that situation and completely panicked. I spent the next ten minutes (that I didn’t really have because I was now going to be late) vacuuming, wiping down every single surface, removing crushed muffins from my upholstery, and spraying the shit out of every soft surface so my car smelled less like toddler pee on a 94 degree day with 99% humidity and more like a toddler peed in a field of lavender. The shower I had so looked forward to was completely and utterly negated and I was s.w.e.a.t.i.n.g harder than I was after that run in the air conditioned gym (insert second back pat here). I ran back inside. Slapped more deodorant on and hit the road. My GPS said I would only be two minutes late, so I was feeling confident.
The radio was cranked up loud, because I was basking in the sunroof open wonder that is driving alone when Tom Petty’s Buried Treasure started playing a song called “Bumble Bee” by Searchers. I. Lost. My. Shit and cried. You see, that morning when I was making a little first day of school sign for Ellie to hold, my sweet little girl told me that when she grows up she wants to be a bumblebee like her gramma (because her great grandmother is affectionately called Grandma Bumblebee). I knew I had to get it together before I saw her so I pulled my sunnies on and sucked all of that ugly cry snot down. I made it to school, took the weird two block drop off route, and as I pulled up in front of the school realized I was the only person picking up a kid at that time….and the kid that I was picking up was standing at the front door of her school with her entire body and face pressed up against the window as I rolled past. I hope I never forget how hilarious she looked in that moment.
My future bumblebee requested to go get pancakes at a “festeraunt” so we to a breakfast placed and ordered spaghetti like any self respecting toddler would do. I’m not sure what she actually learned today, besides the world is one huge disappointment in that when you’re told to expect a dragon, it’s just some boring ass lizard, but she finally nailed a thumbs up after months of practice, so obviously that private school tuition is already paying off.