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Sunday, September 20, 2009

Well, That Didn't Take Long!

I received R.'s first phone call home from the teacher. Already. Yup, I knew the day would come, I just didn't expect it to be so soon.

R., though very feisty, can also be quite the scaredy cat. She can be clingy with me when faced with a new situation or with new people. Once she sees that she is safe, she warms up quite quickly. But until the thaw has begun? She wants no part of anything.

A prime example was Kindergarten orientation. She cried. She clung. She refused to go to school. When the children lined up with their new teacher to be taken on a tour, she begged for me to go. I walked along with her to her classroom and stopped at the door. She went right in and that was that. She came back skipping and waving.

She continued going to school every day with a smile on her face. Then on Thursday, R. got the rug pulled out from underneath her tiny body.

The teacher's voicemail explained that a new student had joined their class and R. became extremely upset.

My brow furrowed.

Mrs. C. said that R. was crying and saying that she did not want this new student in their class. She wouldn't eat her snack. "She's quite the stubborn little thing!" The teacher went on to say.

"SEE?! No one believes me!" I thought to myself. That petite, sweet angel. Yea, until you piss her off!

Apparently, the teacher got a load of my darling daughter's willpower. She wouldn't stand to say the Pledge of Allegiance and glared at the teacher when she told her to get up. She didn't want to go to gym class. She didn't want to participate in circle time. She didn't want to budge from her chair.

She was petrified of this new child and how a monkey wrench was thrown into her now comfortable existence in Kindergarten.

When she came home from school we discussed what had happened. She is very perceptive and understood everything that we talked about. The conversation went very well and I was convinced that everything had been smoothed over.

The next morning she awoke happily, bounced down the stairs, and plopped on the couch. I told her she needed to get dressed for school.

"Oh, I'm not going to school today," she answered.

"Um, yes, you are," I replied.

"Will HE be there?"

"Of course."

"Then I'm not going. Someone was absent yesterday. So you can be absent. I am going to be absent today."

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I knew the next hour was going to be a nightmare but I also found it quite amusing that she had figured this all out. I dug my heels in and after a small battle we headed out the door to school.

I had written the teacher a note and told her that I would actually be in the school for about an hour that day for Library duty. If she needed me, I had my cell phone.

I must have checked that cell phone a few dozen times. No calls.

Upon picking her up, R. came out, with a huge grin on her face. I got a thumbs up from Mrs. C. and I stopped holding my breath.

R. pointed to a rather large boy in the line of children. "That's him mommy. He's nice."

I looked over and it became perfectly clear to me WHY R. had been so shaken up. This child was the size of a 2nd grader. He towered over R. and reminded me of a very young Moose from the Archie comics.

Maybe she can hire him as her bodyguard, that way she'll ALWAYS feel safe!

3 comments:

Laura Marchant said...

I am shocked she has figured out the absent thing already and wanting to ditch, lol

Laura said...

OK- she is one smart cookie!!!!!

Wait till high school!!!!!

Yeek!

Patois42 said...

Glad you got her there again!

And, yeah, she's far too smart. Perhaps she should skip a grade (or two)?