New Year, New School

It's been a long, sometimes boring, summer for my boy.  Most of his friends have divorced parents and were out of town for the summer to live with the "other" parent.  Or they were in camps (which we used to do but can't afford right now).  He spent much of it either on his bike in the woods with his dad or on his butt in front of the computer or video games while I worked at home.  There were a couple of highlights - a week of sleep-away camp and three horse-back riding lessons, but otherwise it's been very quiet and very long.  You can see why ZBoy might be anxious to go back to school.  After the disaster of last year, it kind of surprised me, but he was quite thrilled to have the start of school finally arrive.  Yesterday was the day!

He's attending a charter school now.  It's much smaller than the zoo that was his middle school last year.  They have to wear uniforms, which is fine with me.  It takes the pressure off figuring out what to wear every morning.  I was up Sunday night hemming pants.  He's had a rather astounding growth spurt this summer and I didn't want to do it too early and have him wearing floods to school.  As it was, the pants I bought thinking I'd need to take up a couple of inches just had to have the hem turned up once (and I left the hem intact because it probably won't be long before I have to let them down again).  He's taller than his sister-in-law now and almost as tall as me. 

He'll be riding the bus (which has a stop very close to our house), but the first day I drove him and the massive bag of supplies to school.  Somehow, a crucial piece of paper disappeared from his folder and he didn't have a schedule when we went to Orientation on Thursday night, so we had to go to the office to get his schedule before class.  The problem was quickly sorted out and as we headed back downstairs so he could wait in the cafeteria for the first bell, I grabbed his arm and stopped him on the landing.  He's at that age now, embarrassed by public displays of affection by parental units, so I just said that I wasn't going to hug or kiss him when I left, but that I loved him and hoped he had a wonderful day.  He smiled at me and said thanks.  I think it was for not hugging him and hoping he'd have a great day.  I kept walking as he turned off for the cafeteria, but I glanced back at his head disappearing into the crowd and felt that little hitch in my heart that comes with each milestone goodbye.  There is no denying that my baby is growing up.  His head was above most of the others in the hallway.

He called me as soon as his dad picked him up at the bus stop.  He had a great day, he LOVES his school and I could tell he was feeling relieved.  The first day at Raa he knew it was going to be a tough year.  There are no such misgivings this year and I'm glad.  Now he can spend his energies learning instead of dealing with his environment.

We're off and running!