Hair Standing on End....Calendar Overload

by

Patti Dickinson

What was I thinking?  I have been living by the school-year-calendar for so long that I think of quarters, semesters, and school's end.  Time off in the summer....from lost library books, forgotten field trip permission slips, the occasional detention (and that would require me ad libbing a convincing lecture when the detention slip is presented for a parental signature), conferences and all the other things that go hand-in-hand with having one/two/three/four kids involved in elementary/middle/high school.  Last night was pretty typical for May.  A kid that needed to be at a swim practice, and a kid that needed his parents at the high school tennis banquet.  This was after a day that required my presence in the six-month dental chair, a run to the grocery store to get the ingredients for a meat/vegetable for the banquet. Today was a mammogram and an eye doctor appointment.  Follow that by a Journalism Banquet, in the same cafeteria where we sat last night for the tennis banquet!!!  (As an aside....my husband and I are both doing Weight Watchers.....throw that idea out the window.  Have you ever been to a high school banquet?  Fried chicken, creamy, cheesy, sour cream laden potatoes, and cake.  I have no more Weight Watcher points left.....for the WEEK!!!)

And so the school year draws to a close.  And in the coming weeks we will attend two of our kids' graduations...one from high school and one from college.  Endings and new beginnings. But first, we will savor the summer....flip flops, sun sprinkled faces and time to spend together as a family, uninterrupted by the have-to's.  I'm ready.