First Day of School

Part 1: Early Morning Crisis

5:30 a.m. the phone alarm goes off. I’m already awake. The white light of dawn is filling the room since I’d left the curtains open for just that purpose. We’re all on the mattresses on the floor: me, Miles and Eliza. David’s out of town. Eliza’s been crawling into our bed in the middle of the night most nights since we moved to “the big house.” Miles has been in our bed all night the last two nights, unable to fall asleep on his own and with no Daddy around with the patience to lie down with him on his little mattress.

I hate to use the term, but we have what’s called a “rape gate” that blocks off the upstairs bedrooms from the rest of the house. D asked me to get a padlock for it, and we’ve been locking it at night. The owners of the house installed this and other security measures (electric fence, night guards, alarm system, etc.) during war times, I suppose. It’s typical of most houses here, though you don’t hear of any more security incidents than you’d find in, say, Chattanooga, TN.

I head downstairs to make coffee. Halfway down, I drop the key. It bounces through the bars of the gate, down four more steps and into the hall far out of reach. I sit down on the steps.

Tari, the housekeeper, lives in the guest cottage next door. It’s really early, but I figure she’s my only hope. I call her. She’s quick to head over. She’s got a key to the kitchen door. I hear her struggling to open it. OK. Stupid expat move #2: looks like I left my key in the door. Hmmm. I see her work her way around the house to check the sliding glass doors, but as I know, I locked the place up well. There are bars on all the downstairs windows, too.

I decide to wash my face and brush my teeth. I correctly surmise that I am not thinking well due to lack of coffee; however, the adrenalin has started pumping due to situation.

Aha, maybe there are more keys! Maybe D put them somewhere obvious like…yes!...the nail on the wall of the bathroom!

Part 2: Somethings Special

The night before Miles had discovered that he has his first loose tooth. We thought it auspicious that M would have his first loose tooth on his first day of school.

Secondly, on the way to school, at the intersection of Addington and Ridgeway North, Miles spotted two zebras behind a chain-link fence. We’d never seen that before, and that’s a road we take daily. Very cool.

Miles and Eliza were happy at their prospective drop-offs. (Note to David: We arrived at 7:23 a.m. It took us 18 min. to get there with no wrong turns; he was the second to arrive. It took another 10 min. to get to E’s school…with 4 wrong turns. Don’t worry, I’ve got it all mapped out now. Should only take 5 min. Regardless, she was second to arrive.)

Part 3: Mid-morning to Early Afternoon Crisis

Around 10 a.m. I came back to M’s school to submit some forms and look into volunteering opportunities. As I rolled on to the school grounds, I immediately spotted M’s water bottle under a tree, and yes, on the beautiful green lawn, there he was with his new classmates throwing frisbees! I parked at a distance to spy. He was interacting with another boy. It appeared as though they were actually trying to throw back and forth to each other. This was good. (I later discovered the “boy” to be a feisty, red-headed Eleanor with a posh English accent.) He was reprimanded for touching a big ball that they weren’t meant to play with – it sounded like he’d been warned a few times before. I didn’t hear any yelling or crying from M, though. That was…not bad. Eventually, I noticed Miles correctly try the back-hand instead of the “flick” that was just going to the ground. Ah, he listened and followed directions and the disk flew to his new friend! I moved on.

I stopped into the administration office. The door was open, but when I entered and saw Miles’s teacher in there, I had the distinct feeling I’d interrupted a conversation about a certain family member. Later, I figured the file in her lap was Miles’s (read: what’s the story on this boy?!). She had good things to say: “Was he using the same Oxford book at his last school or does he just have a very good memory? He was able to repeat the story verbatim after hearing another child read it out loud once.” On the down side: he was “testing her every chance he got” and showed her his “angry face” (see Stanley Kubrick films for dead ringer villainous expression…Clockwork Orange, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket…chin tucked in, eyes rolled up into head, growling under-bite).

On my way to the next building, I caught another glimpse of M. His whole class was under the tree and he was far away in the field by himself. That didn’t look good. I assumed he wasn’t coming in when called. (Later confirmed.)

After my meeting with the after school activities coordinator, I headed back to my car. M’s class was still outside. This time all the other kids were in the field, and M was under the tree by himself. Looked like a time out. Come to find out it was and that M was personally extending his own time-out because he was “so angry at the teacher” that he preferred wailing under the tree to joining his classmates on the field again. Sigh. According to M, he “cried all the way to computer class.” Then he pulled it together in order to further test his teacher for the rest of the day, including apparently a mild case of running away. We have our first parent/teacher/”student services” meeting on Friday!

Part 4: Small Mercies

Eliza has bitten holes in both sets of water wings we brought, and I’ve looked everywhere for replacements to no avail. It’s scary having non-swimmer and a pool. On the way home from school, on the very same intersection where we’d seen the zebras in the morning, there was a guy selling pool floats. He looked like a rainbow-colored Michelin man, covered from head to toe in rings and things. He had one set of PINK arm bands. Needless to say, we had a relaxing afternoon: the kids playing in the pool and yours truly having a much appreciated beer.