Letting go

Today was little Eric's first day of first grade. He did go to Kindergarten last year, but it was private and half day- a world away from the large public elementary school both boys are going to this year. We went in Thursday to meet his teacher, who is, apparently, the most loved teacher in the whole school and, if that weren't enough, a man. Eric was delighted to discover the existence of male teachers.

Yesterday he asked me several times if he would have any time to play in the first grade- the first hint of reluctance he'd shown. He was worried because he hadn't seen any toys in the classroom. I told him honestly that I didn't know, but that I thought the work would be fun. Then on the way to school this morning he said that he'd woken up on the middle of the night and stayed awake for a long time thinking about school. And then he let me hold his hand in the hallway. It's like he read a book on how to break your Mom's heart. He was the only child in a class of 23 who was new to the school, and I had to resist the very strong urge to ask the belovedmaleteacher to keep a special eye out for him.

It's nearly impossibly to get Eric to keep his eyes open when you're using the flash. I took two pictures of him at his desk- eyes closed in both, but I was the only Mom in the room and I could feel him silently begging me not to embarrass him, so I desisted.


When I picked him up he looked shaken- he'd skinned his knee and been hit by a baseball on the playground, but he perked up in the car and I ended up with the impression that it was a pretty good first day. There was a puppet, some animal crackers and some old preschool friends.

The playground, however, seems incredibly dangerous. Eric described it as being made of cement with "thousands of kids running around". Add to that baseballs whizzing through the air at lightening speed and a deranged second grader who kept coming up and yelling inexplicably in Eric's face. I'm taking a lot of deep breaths and revisiting the story my Mom and aunt told me my first summer at camp. One of them, I can't remember which, had written home to my grandmother from the same camp, 30 years earlier, that they were learning how to swim through burning oil and stand up in the saddle during horseback riding. What they meant was, they were learning what to do INCASE they ever had to swim through burning oil (swim under water for as long as you can and splash wildly before coming up for a breath to disperse the flames), and they were standing up in the STIRRUPS while trotting. Nevertheless, my grandmother phoned the camp director in a panic- thoughts of her daughters swimming in a flaming river and balancing on one leg atop a galloping horse making her sick with worry. Perhaps someday I'll laugh and tell the story of the treacherous elementary school playground. But if that second grader touches one hair on my son's head, I will hunt him down, so help me.

While Eric was gone, Briggie (who's first day of Kindergarten is Wednesday) and I sullenly cleaned the house and made some cookies for an after school snack. This:



is what we got. As you can see, I left something out. Luckily, that didn't stop the boys from eating them. Or the dog. Or me:).