Another first for our little Kindergartener. His first Halloween at school. At first I was kind of excited... I ended up not feeling too much beyond annoyance.
Bradley is in a separate classroom on his elementary school campus. We have our own Principal and our kids share a Kindergarten playground, just not with their kindergarteners. Our kids are connected to Ventura County and the elementary school is connected to the school district we actually live in, where the girls are. We walk through their office in order to drop off and pick up our kids. There aren't that many of us who do this, most of our kids are bused to and from...but every day we have to get a pass. They had a secretary last year who was super sweet and one who was nice enough. The nice enough one is still here, the other one left. They both used to admit they knew who we were...the new Principal, has no interest in knowing any of us. He walks around with such a chip on his shoulder he must have constant back pain. The new secretary, like the new Principal, never makes eye contact with us. Who knows, maybe if no one makes eye contact we'll all just go away. I manage a loud and chirpy good morning most days. Perhaps they are not morning people... Perhaps they are not human people... Well, you get what I mean.
It feels very welcoming doesn't it?! Yeah to us too.
So today was the big Halloween parade. Each class carried a sign to let us poor parents find our kids. Turns out our class didn't get a sign. Our kids were lapped, but hey we're a little slower, it happens. Took me a bit to find his class, and I noticed our class was floundering a bit trying to figure out where they belonged in the group. Where they were supposed to walk, to stand. When they decided to sit all the kids down they called Kinder, then First and Second. As we moved over to the seating area a teacher who seemed to have some authority for telling classes where to sit, shrugged and told Bradley's teacher "You can try over there."
And I tried to close my mouth, I did. But of course I gave my morning office smile and said: "We can try huh? Nice."
Luckily, Bradley's teacher told me then that they often take some of the kiddos back at this point. Considering my awesome knee brace and probable inability to get up off the asphalt, the likelihood Bradley wasn't letting me go, and the intense noise and crowd...I knew Bradley really wasn't liking any of this. Considering the only pictures I have are of him trying to climb up my legs into my arms; yeah, my guy was over this parade fun. So off we went back to the classroom, half way there I relented and gave him a lift. The crowd and noise was enough to make me want to hide my head, I couldn't blame him nor would I consider not offering him a little comfort in the midst of chaos. Surprisingly, back in his class, at his desk, he started playing with a duck game and when I said goodbye and asked for a kiss, he lifted his head and did. Not bad. Pretty proud of this little boy!
Skip to the end of the day. Of course today was the massive bowel movement day, and he took out his costume pretty decisively, poor Jedi. But I had thrown in a couple changes of clothes. He came out wearing the school's special jog-a-thon t-shirt. I scooped him up as he ran to me and hugging him tight I laughed and said, "New shirt Young Jedi?" His teacher told me about the accidents. I just laughed, said "Sorry, so all or nothing with him. But that's all right, his shirt is a second costume... Like a kid that belongs at this school." His teacher heard me and grinned, another mom heard me and started laughing, and one of the aides looked confused. Oh well.
So I took my little guy home, we watched Disney together, threw his costume in the wash so that this young Jedi will be ready on Saturday, and then he decided to sleep through his last behavior assessment because it turns out that like his mom, he'd had just about enough of this day as she had. I guess he's a lot more like me than I ever thought. And because of that, because he knows more about those around him than they realize, I show up to these things to make sure that he has someone always on his side. Maybe not the best day for inclusion and whatnot; but in terms of Bradley, pretty good for everything else. And in the grand scheme of things, Bradley walked in his first school Halloween Parade, go ahead and scratch that one off the sand bucket list.
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