Finding Joy in Snarkville

In two short days I will take Duke on a walk that ends with me leaving him in the hands of teachers who will spend 3 hours and 20 minutes a day teaching my son to read, write, and keep his finger out of his nose.  I will then turn around and walk into the quad where the PTA is hosting a coffee — I’m fairly sure there will be Kleenex for parents there too.

I have a huge list of things to do in the next 36ish hours, most of them have to do with cold meds (for me) and crying (again me) and pretending that I’m really a confident mommy who has this whole starting school thing licked.  Oh, and I ought to go pick out a first day of school outfit (for both of us) and perhaps get my boy a haircut.

But this leads me to the ultimate problem of the day: The PTA New Family Pot Luck.  Oh my the problems.  I fretted for two straight weeks on what to bring.  You see I could be myself and completely bring something that is soaked in cream of something soup (or as Prince said, I could use my best skills and make dessert).  However, I have to play to the audience I have here, the hippy, granola, crunchy audience — or are they this audience.  The good news is the PTA didn’t send out a notice saying “no nuts, sugar, meat, non-organic…”  So that was a good sign.  I consulted with the food experts, Queen Mum and Dad, who suggested that I bring a veggie plate.  I consulted my friends here who suggested strawberries.

Then I promptly got ill.

Well, I should say that I sent Prince off for much of the week, then I got sick.  At first I tried to convince myself that I was having a horrible allergy attack.  I took allergy meds.  I opened a new box of Kleenex.  Nothing helped. As I went to bed last night, I wondered if I had a fever, so I stuck the thing in ear and pressed the button only to discover that indeed I had a fever — a 100+ degree fever.  So, I put myself to bed with my bottle of Nyquil.  I slept in ONE hour spurts, yes, you read that right. I felt no better today, but that didn’t mean that my day could be spent in bed.  Oh, no, I had pre-kindergarten work to be done, and a pot-luck to worry about.

I bought more meds when I went to the store and bought strawberries and blueberries.  I quickly pulled together a fruit salad and put it in the fridge.  Then I took a shower (steam and a shower soother was the only way I was going to pull off that I wasn’t sick at the Pot Luck) and proceeded to put on my mommy mask.

Oh, what’s a mommy mask, you ask?  It is that outfit you wear to feel confident when you don’t.  When I was young, I had one when I dated, I had another one for work.  It was the look that said, “I’m confident and in control.”  Well, I needed that today.  I needed to feel confident when I was feeling anything but.

Why was I less than confident?  Well, I’ve had exactly NO commuication about the first day of school.  I barely know what time to come back and pick-up Duke.  I’ve got no supply list, no ‘please bring these things on the first day’, no ‘your precious baby will need a snack and an empty backpack’, exactly nada.  I’ve been, um, freaking out.  My friends tell me their schools have TALKED to them.  I called the school secretary, who was probably sick of the 59 other kindergarten moms calling and actually gave me mixed answers.

Well, I put on my mommy mask (the “I can handle anything you throw at me” suit — which roughly looks like dress jeans, a blue oxford button down, and lipgloss) and carried my fruit salad to school.  Duke and I walked the two blocks — my bowl was heavy.  I arrived to a table of store bought pasta salads and cookies (plus the promised hot dogs).  Ok, one problem down — this wasn’t a granola crunchy crowd (bonus: people were eating my fruit salad).

Then I got my moment, I spoke to the principal for a moment.  She was kind and reassuring and seemed to appreciate that not everyone liked not knowing what to expect day one.  As I said, “I have complete confidence in you and the fact that kindergarten wasn’t invented this year.  I know this isn’t your first time, but it’s mine.”  She was perfect and said she’d remind the teachers to post what to have on day one on the board with the class lists at 5pm tomorrow.

At 5:01pm, Duke and I will be back at the school finding out where we will be going on Wednesday morning.  Then I shall take him out for his “Last Night of Summer” evening!  I might not need my Mom Mask by Friday.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 18th, 2008 at 9:42 pm and is filed under This Child of Mine. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.