Friday, August 3, 2018

Caleb's First Half Week of Kindergarten

Caleb's first day of nightmare - I mean kindergarten - was this past week.  It started off with his alarm beeping for five minutes starting at 6:20 and him just sleeping through it.  He finally woke up when I came in to see if he was up and ready to go (he wasn't) as we had discussed the night before.  After squabbling a bit about what he would wear to school (apparently what we had picked out the night before was no longer good enough), he finally got dressed, made his bed, brushed his teeth and came down for breakfast.  He took exactly two nibbles off of his pancakes and half a sip of milk before it was time for us to head for the bus stop.  So much for heading to school on a full stomach.
We took this picture right before heading out to the bus stop.
This is where the story gets a bit more interesting.  It's also where I start to exhibit signs of PTSD when relaying the story.  Caleb and I headed for the bus stop, just as it started to rain again.  No big deal.  We just brought the umbrella with us.  He had expressed a strong desire in riding the school bus all summer, and we talked about how it would be as we climbed the hill to the stop, all while keeping a close eye on the clock so as not to miss the bus.  Once there, Caleb started to act a bit more hesitant.  You can see the tension in his face and hands in these pictures while we waited for the bus to arrive.  Poor fella.

When the big yellow rectangle came around the bend, I gave him my best pep talk, "You can do this, buddy!  This is going to be so much fun!"  Apparently it wasn't good enough because when it was his turn to get on the bus, he wouldn't budge.  He would not be pushed or prodded or bribed to get on that bus.  Understandably, the bus driver couldn't wait forever, and she closed the doors and started to drive off.  Caleb immediately began to protest that he wanted to get on the bus, and the bus driver gave him one more opportunity...which he did not take.  As the bus drove away, Caleb was crying and yelling that he wanted to ride the bus.  Too late, bud.
So we quickly ran (well, I mostly drug him) back down the hill to hop into the van to take him to school.  Once there, he walked in with me just fine.  Then he slipped and fell on the floor in the cafeteria as we walked to his classroom, but he got over that pretty quickly.  In his classroom, as I was starting to leave, it became evident that he was not going to let me leave without a fight.  And fight he did.  The last thing I recall as I was trying to leave was him hitting his teacher who was trying to keep him there.  Great start to the school year.  All the other students were quietly coloring or talking with their new classmates.  I walked out of the school wondering if there was a page or two about starting kindergarten missing from my parenting handbook.  While I drove away in tears of frustration, the school bus that he should have been on pulled into the parking lot.
I called the school half an hour later to see if he had calmed down, which I was informed he had.  Incidentally, I'm sure that I have been labeled as "that parent" by the office staff because I called to check on my child within the first hour of the first day of school.  Sheesh.
Thankfully, he rode the bus home with no problem and received a good report from his teacher.  She even sent this little note home:
RaRa took him out for ice cream to celebrate his first day.
I was sure that day two and three would be better.  In actuality?  Have you ever seen Groundhog Day?  That's how it was, even down to the beeping alarm that is seemingly incapable of arousing him from his slumber.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  Today, we did just skip the miss-the-school-bus-step and went straight to school.  I'm told that Tony pretty much had to pull him out of the van, and two teachers had to practically carry him into the school.  Nevertheless, he had another good report from the teacher and actually seemed to enjoy school today.
Now I know why the first week of school starts in the middle of the week.  The students, parents, teachers and staff couldn't handle five days of this in a row!  All I can say is that I've never been so happy that tomorrow is Saturday (and that we can turn that stupid alarm off)!  Here's to a better week next week...

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