Middle School

Everyone always talks about how emotional and difficult it is to send your kindergartener off to school.  For me, it really wasn’t.  My school aged kidlets were always excited and ready to go to kindergarten, and while I missed them during the day, I had no qualms about them being happy at kindergarten, no worries that they were ready.  It was a good thing.

No one really seems to talk about how crazily hard it is to send your child off to the first day of middle school.  For me, it was really hard.   Not all bad, but still really hard.  There are so many great things about middle school, things that make me so happy and joyful  about having a middle schooler:   the endless list of opportunities to grow and blossom into one’s true identity are at the finger tips of a middle schooler.  I am hoping my girl seizes them and runs!  Middle school was actually one of my favorite times in my life (although my school was so small that it wasn’t really referred to as middle school).

I don’t think it was one of my parents’ favorite stages, however.  And although I loved middle school, I have vivid recollections of being terrified for the first day of seventh grade, when I moved to an educational schedule that involved switching classes every period.  There were only six kids in my grade, and four in the grade above and below me, all of whom were in all my classes.  We didn’t have lockers.  We didn’t have to run a combination lock.  There was only one hallway in my school for grades 7-12 and one hallway for grades k-6.  There was pretty much no way to get lost.

My daughter’s middle school has a student population bigger than my college.  Although I’ve been working all summer to wrap my mind around the experience of parenting a child through that kind of middle school, I was definitely a bit unprepared when this week came.  And my middle schooler was anxious and disgusted about starting school, which I couldn’t fix.

That’s OK.  I could still put on a cheerful face and sincerely  talk a lot about all the great aspects of middle school.  And take her out for ice cream after a crazy night at the open house for her school.

Open house was Wedesday evening, and YaYa had her first full day of middle school yesterday.  At open house we navigated the school to find her homeroom.  Then I squinted at the tiny print in her schedule and navigated as we searched for her locker and tried to follow a path through the school for a typical school day.

Her school is a big place.

After a great deal of searching, we found her locker.  I swear the numbering on the lockers was crazy, but maybe not.  We were both a little anxious.  Suddenly, there we were, standing in front of a tall, red locker with a gleaming black combination lock.  It suddenly occurred to me that I had NEVER had the opportunity to work a combination lock before.  And there I was, trying to figure it out.  Unsuccessfully.  To my credit, the process was a bit quirky, and lots of other people around me with a lot more experience with combination locks were having difficulty too. The little girl next to YaYa’s locker was just as anxious as YaYa and had been reduced to tears at the difficulty of getting that blasted red door open.  Finally the (nice and patient)  dad of the girl next to YaYa’s locker showed me how the combinations worked.  Then I practiced.  Unsuccessfully.  After about 20 minutes of practicing I had it down.

Yet, there I was, an adult who constantly confuses left with right (why can’t we all use East and West?) trying to teach my anxious middle schooler how to run a combination lock.  Thankfully, we managed to laugh our way through it, and after she finally managed to open that red locker once, we decided to take a break and explore the rest of the building  and come back for more locker practice in a little bit.

The middle school is a big place.  Have I mentioned that?  Many floors.  Many staircases.  A map would have been a very helpful thing.

After navigating her day and meeting a couple of teachers, we came back to the tall red locker with the gleaming black combination lock and practiced.  And practiced.  And practiced.  And then my girl, who was wide eyed and overwhelmed said it was time to go, because really, a brain can only comprehend SO many new experiences at once, and hers was shutting down.

Throughout the whole open house, I felt like I was divided into three parts.  A third of me wanted to jump in one of the classrooms and start teaching!  I LOVED teaching middle school kids, loved it.  They were one of my very favorite ages.  I loved their energy and enthusiasm and I didn’t mind all the drama that came with them.  Another third of me wanted to transform back into a middle schooler myself, so I could  go to band class and start all those fun new activities, and explore all the learning materials and grow and learn.

The final third of me was gripped by the deathly fear that I was about to start parenting a middle schooler.  There are mean kids in middle school.  There are umpteen challenges and responsibilities in middle school that need to be conquered, and I really just wanted to shrink my girl back down to kindergarten, a year I am much more experienced at parenting at this point.  I came home rather nauseated.  My ice cream didn’t even taste good.

It was a quiet night here for the most part, and YaYa was up and ready for breakfast the next morning, much more relaxed than she’s been for days.  We marked all the classrooms on her schedule and highlighted her locker number and the combination for her lock.

She was pretty disgusted with me for wanting to document her leaving for school, and I had full intentions of taking pictures of her getting on the bus, but I got busy meeting and talking to the mom of the family with kids that is moving into the house across the street from us, and forgot to take the picture which meant that my girl looked a little bit happier getting on that crowded bus.

In the middle of the afternoon she was, of course, back home.  I was thankful that she had found the right bus to ride home (out of 28 buses to choose from!) The day went OK.  She got lost a few times, but so did everyone else.  She couldn’t open her locker, but the teacher that she really liked right next to her locker helped her figure it out.  All the sixth grade teachers were nice and helpful.  I knew they would be.  The worst disasters of the day didn’t happen to her (one poor girl went out an emergency exit by mistake and started an intruder alarm that loudly rang throughout the whole school).

Today it was much easier for her to get up and go to school because she had a better idea of what to expect.

From now on in our family a prerequisite for the summer before middle school will be extended periods of time practicing working combination locks.  That should ease some of the anxiety for YaYa’s younger siblings.