I have come home from my first parent teacher conference with a bottle of wine. Be forewarned that I am drinking said bottle as I type this. I would say I am just having a glass, but that would just be lying, and I prefer to dwell on the fact that my impetuous wine purchase following my children's parent teachers conference will soon having me feeling as blissful as when I first woke up today, unaware of the onslaught of misery ahead that is commonly referred to as Wednesday.
This day has sucked ASS. Pure, unadulterated ASS. One after another, my hopes of a seemingly normal Wednesday were shattered to hell and back, and then kicked me in the face for good measure. Mackenzie, my youngest twin, is sick due to the fine layer of pollen that has encompassed our home. She looks like a blow fish about to explode, and although my motherly instincts tell me to dote on her every whim and need currently, the conniving, selfish bitch in me was somewhat disappointed that my personal mommy time was now to be spent shopping for the exact fucking Popsicles she wanted, picking up snot rags everywhere and Googling industrial uses for mucous. My son Johnathon - the other twin hell bent on ruining my alone time, comes home from school limping because he hurt his ankle at some point during the day - no doubt in an intense testosterone ridden 4th grade boy chase girl scenario on the playground. My oldest, Elizabeth, is still convinced the world revolves around her and needs a ride RIGHT NOW to wherever it is she is going to go. And I, still grieving the loss of my mommy time, realize that I have a parent teacher conference today as well. GO TO HELL WEDNESDAY...I hate you.
I drug the first kid with Benadryl, drug the second kid with Ibuprofen, drive the third kid to where she needed to go (however much I wanted to drug her as well, she guilted me with the priority of having a school project to work on) and then I go to the parent teacher conference. How dare my kids teachers care so much about my children that they actually want to speak with me regarding their progress.
In reality, I am very thankful for my children's teachers - they are the most unrecognized profession as far as I am concerned and deserve not only higher salaries, but goddamned medals of valor. I celebrate the day I send them back to school after a long ass summer of whining that they are 'bored', whereas they have to deal with them all day long and instruct them on how to be educated responsible members of society. My hat is off to them. Really, it is.
My twins are as different as night and day - actually, they are myself and my husband reincarnate. My oldest was the 'trick' God bestowed upon us - you know, the perfect child that makes you want to have more. Then we get what our parents cursed us with; the 'I hope someday you have kids JUST LIKE YOU' curse. We got TWINS, a boy just like my husband, and a daughter just like me. I would like to say that I wish we stopped at the one to prove the curse wrong, but the truth is I love these kids like nothing in the world. What better way to leave my legacy behind than to have a daughter who acts JUST LIKE ME, that I can mold into an even better version. Take THAT, God.
So there I sit, in the conference, as nervous as if it were my own conference. I instantaneously revert back to fourth grade mentality, worried that I am going to be punished for STILL not knowing fractions and sometimes having to multiply with my fingers. I blame that on the Moscato, even though I did not drink in fourth grade but Moscato takes me back to that level at times.....
The teacher starts with how Johnathon is progressing, that he is really a good kid and even though I practically have to sit on him at home to get his shit done he is really taking things more seriously in class. His only problem seems to be that although he is purely capable of making straight A's he seems to just not give a shit, rushes through his work, and basically does a half assed job. She is frustrated that she knows how smart he is and just seems bored. We come up with a game plan to get him more interested. We agree that this kid is gonna make it.
Then we move on to my Mackenzie. My sweet mini me. She is the opposite of her brother - she loves to learn, does the work required, does extra work when asked, and generally is not a problem. But there is one....thing.....
I brace myself. BUT?? I hate that word at the beginning of a sentence. It signifies that although someone has just told you one thing, they are about to bash you with another. Or justify an apology; you know, that whole "I'm sorry, BUT....." bullshit.
"I don't want this to come off the wrong way, but I have been very concerned with Mackenzie's spelling and writing," the teacher says. I think to myself, okay - concerned as in she is discussing what she really wants to do with that friggin spelling paper, concerned as in she is discussing in detail what happens when mommy and daddy close the bedroom door...how concerned are we here?
"Some teachers here went to a conference on Dyslexia that unfortunately I was not able to attend. I asked them to look at Mackenzie's writing as I sensed a problem. They too, are concerned that there may be some issues we need to look into in order to help Mackenzie further. I do not want you to think we were keeping this from you, but I just wanted to make sure before I made you aware of it that there was in fact a possible reason for concern."
I am stunned. First off, I am stunned that my perfect babydoll is having a problem. As much as we love our children, a problem, in whatever form, comes off first hand like WE did something wrong. Like we have somehow failed our children. Like WE should have caught this. The fourth grade mentality is flooding back again, but this time it has nothing to do with fractions or multiplication - it is that I have let my child DOWN. After I feel like a complete imbecile for not recognizing this, I feel an overwhelming sense of thankfulness that there are still teachers in the world that actually give a shit - that do not let our kids fall through the cracks, that WANT them to succeed as much as we do.
Choking back tears, I ask what we can do. ANYTHING. Name it. This is my swollen blow fish kid who dominated my day picking up her snot rags, and is now dominating my heart and needs our help. We are going to have her evaluated further and go from there, and I am reassured that 3rd-4th grade is when these issues pop up the most and now is the perfect time to correct them.
So my kids ask why I am drinking a bottle of Moscato after a conference. I am sure they think it was in fact horrible and I will be disconnecting the Wii again shortly - but in reality it is because I am celebrating the fact that I DO in fact have awesome kids, and am thankful to live in the school district I live in.
That, and I do my best work when drinking, and am planning medal of valor for Mackenzie's teacher as we speak in the form of an end of year trip to the day-spa.
Not exactly a medal of honor, but at least it is a way to thank her for caring about my kid even half as much as I do.
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