As you may recall, my daughter chooses not to walk with me to school. Walking with me, she says, makes her sad. So she goes across the street to walk with Beetle and her kids. Every morning I send her off across the street. Every morning she walks happily with them. Sometimes she’ll see me–I still walk the boy, after all. But she just smiles and waves, unless I make the suggestion that I walk her to her classroom, which then sets her little face a quiverin’ and Beetle quickly takes her by the hand and whisks her away from her mean old mother.
Except this past Wednesday. On Wednesday, the girl decided she didn’t want to go to school. She really, really did not want to go to school. Refused to go to Beetle’s house. Refused to leave the front door. I finally sent the boy on his way himself, and I took the girl by the arm, and I pretty much dragged her the entire two and a half blocks to school, with her screaming and crying the entire way, “No, no, no! I don’t want to go to school!” I find it amusing how little notice this gets from anyone.
The school has a single crossing guard (the rest were all cut due to our dismal town budgets). She’s a fantasticly cheerful woman who stands on the corner we cross, and she greets everyone with gusto. I really like our crossing guard. She can make you smile on a bitter morning. She can make the boy smile on a bitter morning. That’s a feat.
This Wednesday, I drag the girl across the street to the school. She’s wailing. Our crossing guard cheerfully says, “Oh, you have someone new today! Is this a neighbor?” Â Yes, that’s right. We’ve been in school for six months and this is the first time I’ve been seen with my own daughter. All I could do was look at the crossing guard and say, “I wish.”
