May Craze

Is it--can it--how is it possible that today is May 18? And I see I haven't posted since April. Nice.

What can I say, except that it's been busy? It's been busy. The boring truth. And yet in all of that busy time I have not yet managed to plan REALLY AT ALL for that thing which happens in two and a half brief, brief weeks, which is the end of school. Silas will escort Helen to swim practice every morning: that's about as far as we've gotten. In theory there will be a babysitter afterwards. That will require hiring a babysitter, however, and that...hasn't quite happened yet.

The kids are not too worried.

An ambulance? I'm not too sure of the significance of this event.

By not posting I managed to bloggily ignore the most boring of all holidays to write about, Mother's Day, which involved the kids actually making me breakfast (the oatmeal they made was in fact creamier and more delicious than that which I usually make for myself), and, more to the point, cooperating and not yelling at each other, which I weepily told them was the most wonderful gift of all. I also got a hat, and M. went and rented a rototiller and ripped up half the back yard. This is one of those household projects that was technically owned by me but which I'd figured out some time ago was not something I could actually accomplish by myself, and would in fact be better done entirely by the strong-armed family member, and thus had been a hopeful topic of discussions like this -

Me: "So I'm hoping to rototill the yard today. It really needs to be done this weekend. Do you think you can--"
M.: "I'm scorekeeping [at Si's baseball game]. It can't happen this weekend."
Me, unrealistically: "So maybe you can drive the Subaru and I can take the truck over to Home Depot-"
M.: "Do we know where the cable line is buried?"
Me: "No, but--"
M.: "I'm scorekeeping."

So that was the second most wonderful gift of all. Now I have been running home from work every day to gaze at the bare dirt for signs of grass seed sprouting (so far, nothing. At this point I always wonder if the seed thing is just going to not work, and all those other times seeds were planted and watered and then sprouted were just a fluke.)

Bye bye, 5th grade!

Also like tests.

Si is readying for middle school. The part he's looking forward to the most? The food. ("They sell donuts! And the cafeteria smells like real food." I didn't disabuse him of this fantasy, even though, kiddo, I'm sorry, but it all comes from the same warehouse.) He's also looking forward to the math, which is elaborate and extensive and also, apparently, extremely accountable, as in, they test these kids to within an inch of their lives. In April, the 5th graders took a test, on which he did well enough to receive a letter that said, in part, "Congratulations! Now you've qualified to take another test. Depending on the results of this test, you may be able to take another test at a later date." Apparently he did, and yesterday he got to go to the middle school and take it. I think he may get to take another one before he's done. And maybe one after that.

Now, I'm no unschooler - you will pry my curriculum taught by professional teachers at a nonhome location from my cold, dead hands - but even this seems to grimly encapsulate the entire school experience. Sigh. At least at this juncture Si still finds the tests exciting - and he, like is parents, is blessed/cursed with being a "good test taker." Hopefully he will be better than his mother at "negotiating salary" and "understanding that bosses and professors are actually colleagues, not mistily distant authority figures."