School Day 2: Mommy's Mess-Up

The power went off briefly at the house yesterday, causing my alarm clock to go on the blink. I set it last night before bed, set the alarm, and collapsed into sleep. This morning: I rolled over and looked at the alarm clock, and it said 6:37. I started to roll back over, and then leapt out of bed. 6:37? Shit! It turns out when setting the clock I set it for AM instead of PM, but managed to set the alarm for AM, so it never went off, obviously. I got her up and to the table, poured her a bowl of cereal, inhaled a bowl of cereal of my own, then checked the clock: 6:50. She's having a leisurely breakfast, eating her Trix by color group (OCD much?). I woke Brian up and asked him to get her through breakfast and dressed so I could shower. I took a quick shower, got dressed, fixed her hair, and we were in the car and backing out of the driveway by 7:30.

While I was getting my stuff together at the house I had jokingly said, 'I guess you don't want to be walked up to your class anymore, do you?'. And she agreed! 'Just drop me off, mommy'. What? No, I was kidding, I'm not ready for that! Brian was horrified and insisted that I park and walk her to her class (it's all of ten or fifteen feet). While in the car she kept saying, 'just drop me off, just drop me off'. I felt panicky - what should I do? Finally I decided - I'll do what she wants. So I asked her for the last time what she wanted, and she said she wanted me to drop her off. So I did. I pulled into the carpool line instead of parking, and a handsome young eighth grader came to the door and helped her out of the car. She gave me a little smile while I was frantically assuring her that I loved her and to have a good day and to BE GOOD, and handsome eighth grader slammed the car door, took her by the hand, and walked her over to her class. I was driving slowly and erratically, watching her in the rearview mirror, and she was fine. I actually went so far as to park, I was going to get out and watch her again, then reconsidered and backed out and left. Sigh. It's all letting go, this stage. Letting go.

I quizzed her last night on her goings-on at school: they read a story about a mouse, and then they made a mouse face out of construction paper using glue. She was very smug about using glue by herself: we make a lot of things at the house and I have never let her apply it. I suppose I'll have to, now. Then they played outside on the playground, with their teachers. They had a snack. That's all she could remember. I casually asked her what her and her friend Margaret were talking about (see yesterday's post, where I was dying to know), and she said, "Backpacks and cars". Hmm. I see. She told me about her chair with her name on it: it's blue. I asked her who she sat next to: Jack, and some other kid. She said everyone was nice, and everyone played well together, and she was slightly disgruntled and, I think, sick of discussing it. Brian took some pictures, I'll see if I can't manage to put up a couple.

So all is well for now. Once we get settled into a routine things will be better. In a way that will be easier once Brian leaves, because I have used him the last two mornings to watch over Jacelyn while I get ready, and he's leaving Sunday, so I won't have that option. But she was happy and excited to go to school this morning, so here's hoping that it stays that way. My big girl!