Kindergarten

Why oh why do these children keep growing up?  It was with great melancholy that I visited Elijah’s future kindergarten class last night.  By some lovely star alignment and just a little bit of me ignoring my German/Lutheran workaholic gene pool, I took off work early and met the gang in time to travel the 2.5 blocks to Eli’s school (by car).

We entered Washington School and walked down several brightly colored hallways lined with red and yellow lockers.  I managed to suppress the deep seeded childhood fears of the first day of school and put on a pretty casual front. 

“Oh hey.  This is all completely new and different.  No need to throw up in a drinking fountain.”

We eventually entered Eli’s kindergarten classroom.  I was instantly overcome by a single thought: “Is Eli’s teacher a hoarder?”

There was stuff piled everywhere.  Books stacked to the ceiling.  Pile after pile of abandoned telephones.  Crayons.  Stuffed animals.  And blocks.  Oh, there were so many blocks.

Eli and Luca immediately raced around the room, playing with everything they could get their hands on.  Luca was particularly excited by the teetering stack of plastic foreman hats.

Eli’s teacher strolled into the room.  A lovely older woman who spoke like a Sesame Street character.  Even to us, she was more animated than any human I’ve ever seen.  I found myself retreating into silent mode to compensate for her giddiness.

After a brief interview with Eli, she asked us if there was anything she should know about our son before the school year began.

I thought, “He’s the greatest 5 year old in the world.  Every thing that comes out of his mouth is brilliant, hilarious and breaks my heart.  He is polite and kind and genuinely cares about other people.  He loves the color pink and doesn’t care if it’s a girl color.  His laugh is what gets me out of bed in the morning.”

I said, “Nope.  Nothing.”