L.'s last day of second grade is today. They've had "last days" all week, really. Monday was a holiday, and then Tuesday was "game day" and the kids got to sit around most of the day and play their favorite games with each other. I was especially jealous of "bring a book and read" day on Wednesday. I had just gone to the library and checked out some good books for myself to read for a change, and the thought of being given a whole entire school day to lounge around in my pajamas with a pillow and some good books made me drool. L. opted to wear regular clothes, of course, but he did bring a soft pillow and his new favorite book, David Macaulay's Underground.
I'll be sad when his last day is over. Not sad so much because school is out for the summer, but sad because these school years seem to race by too quickly--picking up speed with every year. This past year flashed by us in the blink of an eye, I think. Looking back, I try to remember it, to account for the days and weeks and months, and I see only a blur. I told a mom about this recently in the walk-up line at L.'s school.
"The years will only go by more quickly," she told me, nodding somberly and with a knowing look in her eyes (her son is in fifth grade now). I was annoyed at the gloom and doom pronouncement, though. Why is it some moms always feel inclined to point out the truth to you, when it's so obvious to them--and to you--that you desperately want to hear something else? You want some older parent who has been there and done that to look at you and reassure you that time will slow down, NOT speed up, and that you won't look away and then look back and find your precious child, your firstborn, sitting in front of the school building with the fifth graders. On my way to the library with T., I drive past the high school where L. will probably go--only a handful of years from now. Sometimes, as my car whizzes up the hill past the buildings, I'll get a dizzy feeling inside, and imagine that he is in there, seated in a classroom, and that I won't be able to account for where those in-between years went.
L. had the chance to visit third grade yesterday. When I picked him up, he was uncharacteristically enthusiastic about next year--about how he'll finally get to study stars and space in school, and have a classroom at the other end of the small school building, and that third graders get to read more books! It thrills me, hearing his excitement, and while I don't want the years to race by any faster than they already are, I do look forward to this next one--to the challenges and the leaps and bounds L. will make. Sometimes I feel so split in two, like two different people--one who is a mess of emotions at the passing of another milestone, and another who is bursting with pride about what comes next. I wonder, will it always be this way? Will I always be so split in two, one foot scrambling for a hold in the days of my children's childhoods and the other pushing ever forward, right alongside my quickly growing kids?
This is where, I think, you wiser, been-there-done-that parents step in, give me a gentle nudge, and tell me--yes I will.