The Obligatory Back-to-School Post

One week down. I'd know how many to go, down to the last day, if Eve had the same teacher as last year, because that teacher kept track of how many days of school were left. She also knew how many days were left until her retirement, but she seemed to really enjoy teaching despite that.

Eve was up until after eleven the night before the first day. I think it was partly a shifted body clock from summer craziness and partly excitement. I was a nervous wreck (not for any good reason, just because overreacting is who I am and what I do), and trying to hide it, which was less easy when she ended up in bed with me from nine-thirty on watching the clock and speculating on how she was going to feel going to school the next day on 'one hour of sleep'. She tried reading. I scratched her back. She cuddled her Build-a-Bear with the heartbeat. She wouldn't listen to music because she's convinced that if she goes to sleep listening to music she gets nightmares -- I tried to explain to her the inherent unreliability of anecdotal evidence, but she wasn't buying it.

I don't know how all the other schools do the first day, but I hate, loathe and despise the way our school does it. At 8:15 they open the doors to the gym and everybody crowds in and has to move around in unmoveable conditions looking for the big piece of paper with their kid's name on it. It's hot and airless and really just adds immeasurably to the crappiness of the experience. Last year when we found the list with Angus's name on it the teacher wasn't even there yet. I was happy with the teachers they got, though. Angus has the same teacher he had in grade two for English, and she really got him -- if he said his stomach hurt she'd tell him to have a snack and put his head on his desk for five minutes before letting him call me. He has the male teacher he had for math last year for French, which is good because he loves him, and bad because the guy's French is really quite bad, but oh well. Eve has the teacher Angus had in grade three for a month before things got switched around, and I like her, plus I'm kind of relieved she doesn't have the teacher I was afraid she was going to get. I think of her as the mean teacher, but that's not really fair. Pam's daughter has her, and as Pam puts it, "she's serious. We're silly". I'm sure the kids would be fine, but we might get in trouble. I'll probably be thinking up creative ways to bust Pam out of detention before the end of the year.

The last couple weeks of summer were lovely. Eve and I hung out with Sabrina and her super-delicious two-year-old (and her dog -- it would be a near thing to say who Eve loved more) for a morning, and went shopping for school clothes -- this was the first time she actually wanted to try things on. I'm pretty sure that she not only has a better fashion sense than I did when I was seven, she probably has a better fashion sense than I do now. It's kind of annoying.

I'm journalling this and I know it must be really dull for anyone who isn't me. I'm wobbly and uninspired. I went for a couple of walks and baked an oatmeal cake. I'm trying not to fall back into bad habits on the sleep and diet front, with... mixed results, let's say. Maybe I need a mean teacher to whip me into shape.