Two Down, One to Go

I breathed a sigh of relief this week when two out of three Peevies started school again. Finally. (I'm singing a different tune now than I did when I wrote this post!)

They had been jumping up and down on my last nerve with their constant bickering, and all I wanted to do was drink wine and watch Prison Break reruns and catch up on the episodes of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles that I had missed the first time around.

(Hey, that sounds like I'm a teensy bit depressed. Hmmm. Time to call the high-priced empathist, I mean therapist. Can you actually be depressed when you're already on anti-depressants? Eeeeeenyway...)

Even though I was thrilled to drop the Peeve-monsters off at second and fifth grade, I was also a bit moophy. (Moofy? Moophie? Whatever. You know what I mean, right? like the kind of sad when you make a little sad sound like, "Mooph," and make a little sad frownie face. At my growing up house, we always called that "moophy." I don't actually know if there's an actual word for it, but as you may already know, I do love neologisms.)

The PTL sponsored a back-to-school event that they called "The Boo Hoo/Yahoo Breakfast" (yay, Andrea!) which I think perfectly captures my conflictedness. Because, hello? My baby is in SECOND GRADE? and my angsty-boy is in FIFTH GRADE? I am not even ready for all this growing up.

I did finally break down and buy school supplies just in the nick of time. I dropped $190 on that trip to Tar-Zhay, but it was all worth it when I watched A. Peevie's Face of Pure Delight as he was sorting through his pens and folders and spiral notebooks.

Every day for three weeks leading up to this point, he'd voiced his dread about school starting. "I do NOT want to go back to school, Mom," he said.

"Can you homeschool me, Mom?" he asked, and I told him if I did, one of us would be dead or maimed by the end of the first week.

"Why do we have to go to school anyway? School's dumb. Lots of smart people didn't go to school. Einstein didn't go all the way through school," he pointed out.

But on this day, as he looked through his pile of supplies and checked off items from his supply list, he was happily anticipating the start of fifth grade. "I can't wait for school to start!" A. Peevie said cheerfully.

On the morning of the first day, he was up bright and early, dressed, and in his right mind--and still cheerful about seeing his school friends again. "Can we get there early?" he asked. Silly boy. What, does he think he woke up belonging to a different family or something? I'll settle for being on time, which we were. Barely. A one-time only event. Not a guarantee of future performance.

But day two, he woke up grumpy. I opened his door and called his name gently. "A. Peevie," I said, "Time to rise and shine! Time for school!"

"No!" he yelled. "I do NOT want to go to school." He flung himself deep under his covers as though being unseen would automatically transplant him into a different no-school dimension.

And we had a repeat performance on the third day. "Growl!" he growled. "Grumble, grrrr, ROAR! I hate school! I'm NOT GOING."

Sigh. Only 177 more of these mornings to go until summer! Blissful, happy, sleeping-in summer, with no fights about getting up to get ready for school.

Wait...what? What just happened there?