On the first day of school, I was prepared to drag my kids out of the bed, kicking and screaming if necessary.
I set my alarm for 6 a.m, and after getting up and throwing on some clothes and a little makeup, I went to the kitchen to find my first-grader and kindergartener decked out from head to toe in their school uniforms — hair brushed and pulled back with matching headbands, and their shoes expertly tied.
We ate breakfast and I packed lunches while my stomach did flips.
I asked them if they were nervous and Emma, my 5-year-old, answered, “I’m excited! I can’t wait to learn what is two plus two and what is two MINUS two! I wanna eat wunch in da wunch room…” She continued to rattle off a list of all the things she wanted to do in kindergarten.
As much as I have ranted about the chaos in my home for the last seven years, I wouldn’t trade a single pee-soaked second.
I wouldn’t have been anywhere else, doing anything else, and I knew I was going to be lonely once two of my three daughters were in school full time.
I assumed Aubrey would go into first grade with a blaze of glory, but I was prepared for Emma to be a little sheepish. She’s only gone to half-day preschools in the past.
We walked into the school and Emma immediately assaulted her teacher, “I know my address. And my phone number. And I know how to tie my shoes,” she said.
Emma bounded from one area of her new classroom to the next without the least bit of fear or insecurity.
I was flabbergasted.
Aubrey was quieter.
She took in her new surroundings carefully and worried she would forget her teacher’s name or how to find her classroom.
I was equal parts overjoyed and unnerved to come home to a quiet house with only one child in tow.
Sadie asked before we even made it out of the school parking lot, “Where’s Aubrey, Momma?”
“At school.”
“Where’s Emma?”
“At school.”
“Awwww, man,” my 2-year-old complained, “I wanna get dem.”
Sadie and I cleaned the house so thoroughly I worried my husband would think we had been robbed when he came home from work.
It’s amazing how much you can accomplish without six hands working furiously to undo everything you have done.
Sadie asked me about her sisters every 30 minutes and held my hand as we walked through the house.
She kissed my cheek every few minutes and patted me on the back more than once.
At lunchtime, we sat together at the kitchen table and talked while we ate in the otherwise silent house.
When Sadie’s nap time rolled around, for the first time all summer, she willingly — and quietly — went to sleep.
Being the youngest of three born in four years, I don’t think she’s gotten this much eye contact and one-on-one time with me since I quit breastfeeding.
I woke Sadie up from her nap in time to hit the carpool line, and the first thing she said when I walked her bedroom door was, “Can we get da guhls now?”
I couldn’t wait to see them. I wanted to hear all about their day, detail by detail, blow by blow.
I wanted to know if Emma had finally learned what two plus two is.
Did she eat in the cafeteria?
Did she see her sister there?
Did she fall asleep on her hand-me-down nap mat?
Emma was talking before the teacher was able to shut the car door behind her.
“Momma! I ated in the cafeteria and they let us eat twice! I ate a popsicle! And I saw Aubrey and she waved her hand at me.”
Emma had a five-minute monologue about kindergarten completed by the time her older sister got in the car.
I was just as eager to see Aubrey.
“Hey, big girl! How was your day?” I asked as she pulled herself into the car, sporting her new and bigger than she is backpack.
“Fine.”
She dropped her bag in the floor and buckled her seatbelt.
“Fine? What happened?”
“How was your teacher?”
“Did you make new friends?”
“Did you see Emma in the cafeteria?”
“Did you like the note I put in you lunch box?”
This was not what I had been waiting for all day long.
“What do you want?” She cried. “For me to play the whole day in reverse for you?”
Um, yes. Exactly. Is this asking too much?
At 6:30 p.m, Emma went missing.
I found her asleep in her bed with her favorite stuffed animal tucked under her arm.
Sadie happily got some one-on-one time with her Daddy, while Aubrey and I laid in her bed.
After a warm dinner and a hot shower, she was ready to tell me about her day and I was glad to listen.
As much as I’ve been counting down the years, months and days until my kids started school, I’m now counting down the hours and minutes until my house is once again full of the sounds of little girls laughing and fighting — the sounds of love and life.
•Robin O’Bryant is a mother to three daughters, author and Greenwood resident. Read more at her blog at www.robinschicks.com or e-mail her at robinschicks@gmail.com.
