THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL . . . AGAIN AND AT LAST

I haven't posted in a while. We were out of town, and stuff.

I've found that once I stop posting, I no longer feel like starting again. The cure to that seems to be to post something, anything.

So I'm posting something, anything.

This is a historic August for us. Two days ago, our youngest child started kindergarten.

This happened to us once before, twelve years ago, when we had only two children. The youngest child at that time, the kindergartener, is now a high school senior. Not being able to leave well enough alone, we promptly proceeded to have more children, carefully spacing them so as to postpone the day of "All the Kids In School" for, my gosh, has it really been this long?

I have been waiting for this day, with a lot of trepidation and some curiosity, for quite some time now. I don't know what it will be like. I hope it will be good, and I'm afraid it won't be.

We've had two days of it now: school started on Thursday, for some reason, and today is Saturday. Not enough to get a real taste of How It Will Be to have thirty-five hours a week with everyone in school all at the same time. The house is a mess this morning, and Francie and Lillie are screeching at each other. All is normal.

Next week, Fred is taking a week off work. We're planning to catch up on yard work and do some painting (walls, not pictures), stuff like that. Well, actually I think he's planning to mostly nap and go for bike rides, but I'm planning to get things cleaned up around here.

Then, after Labor Day weekend, we'll really be into the new routine. It will probably be cool enough that the risk of the kids getting out of school a couple of hours early for heat (which still happens here, since not all the schools are air-conditioned) will be past. Labor Day vacation will be over. We'll be used to getting everyone up and gone every morning.

And I'll find out what thirty-five hours a week is really like. Will I discover that I can accomplish great things with it? Will I be a brain surgeon, ten years from now? Will I be so successful that one day Francie and Lillie, unlike their oldest siblings, will be able to fund college on something other than what the Pell grants and scholarships add up to?

Or will I increase our Netflix allotment and discover that I'm a blob who lies around eating chocolate and watching movies all day?

The thing is, I'm not sure I know how to get things done without kids around. I'm used to doing things--things that have nothing to do with kids, like mowing the yard or taking a shower or doing dishes or washing a dog--while simultaneously listening for alarming sounds from the next room. I don't know if I can function under normal conditions.

I'm used to being interrupted regularly. I may have lost my ability to focus on one thing for more than five minutes, somewhere in the past twelve years. I just don' t know.

These two school days that we've had, I was unexpectedly anxious. My husband pointed out that I probably have a nagging feeling that I've left one of the kids somewhere, and I'm sure that's right. I'm not used to NOT having constant responsibility for small beings who are, left to their own devices, quite capable of eating rat poison or running out in front of a car, or at the very least, stopping up all the toilets and painting the walls with ketchup.

Naturally I am concerned when it's quiet. My subconscious is telling me, "You left a kid in the car, didn't you? Something is definitely wrong here. You were supposed to pick somebody up at school, or at Grandma's, and you didn't. Or maybe one of them is drowning in the bathtub or wandering down a busy street. Boy, are you in trouble."

I tell my subconscious to shut up, that everything is fine, and it mutters back that it's sure somebody is starting a fire in the basement.