1 Mother 2 Another

After four straight days of impassable
streets last week, the sun finally came out over the weekend and
turned our neighborhood into a community-sized slushee. And as
happy as I was to get in the car and go somewhere – anywhere,
it didn’t matter where – I still knew that one bad
thing would come with the thaw.


The return of school days.

Maddie had a one-day school week last
week, which in her mind is just about the right amount –
maybe a tad too much, but livable. And Sunday evening was not fun
as she realized her days of freedom were numbered. You’d have
thought she was preparing for her own execution, so unwillingly did
she pick out her outfit and work on her homework.


“Mom,” she complained as she climbed into bed,
“this school thing just isn’t working. It’s just
universally too much.”


Now, I’m not really sure what she meant by that, but it
sounded impressive.


And to tell the truth, if it weren’t for those pesky
governmental agencies that require Maddie to go to school,
I’d be happy to keep her home half the time. Those early
mornings do not come easily to me – I often joke that I
picked a career in the theatre simply so I could sleep in every day
– and I completely sympathize with my girl. It’s not
that she slept in horribly late each day: rather than the 6:30 a.m.
wake-up she needs to get to school on time, Maddie consistently
woke up on her own at 7 or 7:30 each morning. But let me tell you,
that half hour makes all the difference in how our morning goes.


Could school just start a little later? And end a tad bit earlier?
And maybe have a longer lunch so we could hook up with our kids for
a meaningful lunchtime rather than the 20 minutes they’ve got
now? And could we make sure the kids get art and music and p.e.
every day?


That’s all doable, right?