Do your best. Stay focused. Move with urgency.
These are the goals that Clark and I identified for this school year. This school year, where for the first time, he will not be with me all day. To say I've been dreading this day is not accurate. I've been *consumed* by it.
He's my first baby. The baby we prayed for, the baby who I quit my job to stay home with before he became a big brother and started school, and the baby who we checked on each night in his crib to be sure he was still breathing... until he wasn't a baby anymore. I still check on him every night. Just to be sure.
Tomorrow, that baby who now stands 3 feet tall, talks from sun up to sun down (Lord, be with his teachers!) about everything under that same sun, is missing 2 front teeth, has a nose dotted with the cutest freckles, and is sporting a mohawk with a lightning bolt shaved into the side of his head, will get out of my car and walk into school without me. Ryan tells me that I'll then drive my car home and wait until it is time to pick him up, but I have already made peace with the fact that I'll be forcibly removed from the parking lot.
Ryan and I decided before Clark was born that we would not teach our children to be afraid. We acknowledge all feelings as valid, and we have allowed him the space to say all the things he's feeling about school that don't fall under the happy/excited umbrella that we as a society expect 6 year olds to embody. We've talked for hours this summer about how it's okay to be nervous, scared, and sad about not being home this year, but we've also done our best to keep *our* feelings out of his world.
We have saved our sadness, fear, anxiety, and general doom and gloom for each other and for you. Welcome to our pity party. Tissues are on the left, and emotional support chocolate is on the right.
Knowing how Clark was feeling about the changes ahead, we worked together to come up with a motto that we can have for the year and I can say to him each morning at drop off: Do your best. Stay focused. Move with urgency.
Do your best. Clark is going to do awesome. He's a smart, kind, and funny kid. He's been excited to make friends and to have specials like gym and art for two years (I'm a decent 'core subject' homeschool teacher, but PE and art have *never* been my thing). He excels in academics, he has been practicing how to introduce himself, and he is good about remembering his manners. His best is amazing.
I'm going to do my best, too. I'm going to do my best to encourage him and not let him see my sadness. I'm going to do my best to let him be 6 and make mistakes and then make them right. And I'm going to do my best to generally just get out of his way.
Stay focused. Oh, Lord. This is my child who has to start his bedtime routine one full hour before lights out just to have a prayer of making it there on time. "Go to your room and get in pajamas" usually takes 20 minutes, two calls to the Alexa device in his room that he *always* answers with "Sorry, mom! I got distracted.", and all of my remaining patience for the day. He can do hard things (like staying on task), and I will keep reminding him of this.
I'm going to stay focused, too. Focused on the growth that Clark is going to experience and how his independence will continue to expand. Focused on the confidence that I'll surely see sprout up in him. And I'll stay focused on my time with Lincoln, who has never experienced being the only kid in the house.
Move with urgency. I've always been the kind of person who rushes through tasks so that they can be finished and I can have the rest of whatever time is left to myself. And I think it's both science and law that people like me have to marry and procreate with people like Ryan, who doesn't crack open a suitcase to start packing until we should have already left for the airport. And like his dad, Clark can...delay. I'm convinced that the house could be on fire, and Clark would find a reason to LEISURELY walk around in literal circles, holding onto something that needed to be thrown away 10 minutes ago, and looking for his other sock... that's also in. his. hand.
I'm going to move with urgency, too. Both from the parking lot so that I might make it off school grounds before sobbing (or landing a misdemeanor trespassing charge), and throughout the rest of the school year. I'm going to move with urgency and excitement when it's time to pick him up and hear about his day. And I'm going to move with urgency in our time together after school, too. I'm going to be quicker to set my phone down, ignore the laundry, and sit on the floor with both of my babies.
It's here, y'all. First grade waits for no one. He's ready, but I'm going to need more emotional support chocolate.
