The Pawling News Chronicle
partners
Thursday, August 24, 1995
Back to school – something every parent has to face
By Bernadette Shustak, Co-editor
With the sounds of Any Williams cheerfully singing, “It’s the most wonderful time of the year” in the background, a father gleefully wheels down the aisles of a Staples stationery store winging school supplies into his shopping cart as two downcast children shuffle forlornly behind him.
I love that commercial. To me it symbolizes the end of the chaotic long days of summer and the beginning of the routine, structured days of fall.
Yes, it’s back to school time.
This is the time of year when I make School Year Resolutions.
Similar to New Year’s resolutions, I start out with good intentions.
I will make lunches, lay out the next day’s clothing and pack backpacks and tote bags the night before so as to avoid a hectic morning and to give the family time to have a relaxing, nutritious breakfast together.
I will not do homework for my children but will provide them with the materials needed and steer them in the right direction.
There will be no Nintendo on school nights, and bedtime will be at 8 p.m. for the kindergartener and 9:30 for the fifth grader.
As with past New Year’s resolutions, after the first two months I will start to slip.
“Who wants to buy lunch today?” I’ll ask my children, at 8:15 a.m. as they scramble to gather their school gear and I shove Pop-Tarts into the toaster.
Last year I realized I was breaking two resolutions at once, when at 10:45 at night I was trying to retrieve information on-line about Admiral John. L. Worden (a Pawling resident, I might add) for my son’s extra credit history report due the next day.
He was lounging on the sofa coaching an imaginary football game between the Cleveland Browns and the New York Giants with Super Nintendo’s John Madden ’95.
Back to school time is also when I scour the local stores trying to find protractors and seven hard cover composition books (one color for each subject) the “must” items on the class supply list sent home by some obsessive-compulsive teacher.
(I don’t remember ever using my protractor for actual class work. I do know it came in handy picking the lock on my lockerand for keeping my little brother at bay.)
And I’ve only seen the above mentioned composition books in three colors. My son says you’re not allowed to cover them to distinguish one subject from the other.
While on the subject of covering books, I know this year, as in the past two years, my oldest will try to convince me not to cover his books with shopping bags and masking tape.
I will argue that grocery bags are the most durable material. He will beg to use glossy sheets decorated with sports figures or skulls which will shred by the end of his first week back.
I will win the argument and he will go to school mortified that all his books are covered with Grand Union bags (logo face down --- I’m not that mean), his name, grade and subject neatly printed on the cover.
I know he will think this is a calculated attempt by his mother to embarrass him. (I went through a similar phase. It ended when I was somewhere in my early 30s.)
We have resolved that I will not wave to him when he gets on the bus the first day of school or any subsequent days.
However, he is allowing me to accompany and wave to his little sister, since it will be her very first day of school.
Brother and sister will go off to school where their teachers will cram their little minds with all sorts of academic marvels.
They will go to Pawling’s halls of knowledge with their lunches, books and backpacks to be with all their friends and I will remain at home. Alone.
My son will get back in the routine of reading class, trombone, and baseball.
My baby will begin her elementary school career in awe of the piano, blocks and paints that await her each day.
They won’t even think of me, at home, by myself.
I will have no one to do chores or play with, or to keep me company or talk to.
There will be no one to eat lunch with or accompany me to the store. No activities to coordinate or fights to break up. No boo-boos to fix or tears to dry.
Roller blades will stand motionless in the corner of my son’s room and Barbie will sit on the shelf – silent reminders that I am alone.
Maybe this isn’t really the most wonderful time of the year after all.