My heart aches a little this time of year. The back-to-school promotions make me melancholy for days when I was checking off the school supply list for my children as they lobbied for their favorite lunch totes.
There’s a social media video of a mom frantically rushing through Target while counting the reasons she can’t wait to send her kids to school. I admit it’s hilarious, but it doesn’t quite resonate with me. As a young mom, I always found myself counting down the days until summer.
Yet, once the school year was upon us, I jumped in with maternal gusto, signing up to help with class parties, festivals and field trips. I coordinated school drop-off and pick-ups with other parents in our neighborhood. Early dismissal from school — better known as “half days” — were highlighted on my master family calendar for advance planning around work. And I couldn’t leave out the ever-important gift schedule for birthday parties and holidays — Trick or Treat bags for Halloween, Valentine’s in February and end-of-school teacher gifts.
By the time the calendar was complete, it rivaled a corporate project management spreadsheet.
I’m tired just remembering this flurry, making me wonder how the heck I managed it all? This must be why the young have young. The distance between sentimental memory and reality was often delicate juggling between work, home, school, sports and everything else.
For me, the best part about school was picking up the kids in the afternoon.
Sweaty and excited, my son and daughter would pile into our minivan’s back seat and start non-stop talking about their day. I gleaned more in that 10-minute drive from Eighth Street Elementary to our house than a whole week elsewhere. By the time I pulled into the garage, I had the download on history homework (good), math test (ugh) and the presidential fitness test (excellent! A reminder that they were really more my athletic husband’s children than mine). Most importantly, I read between the lines of what wasn’t said — the pause after sharing who made the spelling bee, who sat next to whom at lunch, who got invited to that popular kid’s birthday party and who didn’t (son of a biscuit!).
Today, I drive solo in my compact car, sometimes ending up past the elementary school, remembering car line where the school’s principal, the late, great Helen Ingrao, would shout on her microphone headset the names of students to get in the right car. “Tim, get in the car, hon! We don’t have all day!” Then she’d walk up to my van.
“Hey, Mama,” she’d say in her famous southern drawl. “Boy, it’s hot outside today. Don’t forget we have PTA meeting on Thursday.”
She’d hustle Grif and Gilly into the van, shut the door and tap it for my signal to keep the line moving. She was the original industrial engineer. She was also our leader when we celebrated the school’s historic renovation project that commanded nothing short of a day-long celebration with a building dedication, ribbon cutting with community leaders and full-blown parade in the front of the school.
She died several months later, too soon and unexpected. I still have a necklace she gave to me for co-chairing the celebration.
Sometimes, in the early evening as the moss-covered oaks drew long shadows on the road, I drive through “car line” past Eighth Street, devoid of minivans and children and school staff directing traffic. And I think about what I’d give to have a backseat full of kiddos recounting their innocent days.
To the parents of school-aged children, I wish for you a blissful year of class parties and field trips. Be mindful of those moments in the car. Take it all in and be present — like turn-off-your-cellphone present — because, one day, you will probably find yourself driving past your children’s school wondering what that mist is in your eye.
