The Back to School Blues

checking on her flower garden

I hated going back to school when I was a kid. It was like impending doom as soon as August 1st rolled around and I dreaded any time we drove past LaPaz Elementary. Then as I entered Junior High and High School, the impending doom began about May 1st when I preferred to just stay in school-even though I loved the summer.

Now that I have kids of my own, two very differently tempered kids but both with their father's sense of humor, I could feel the tension around the house this morning with it being the first day back to school. But it was dad and mom that had the blues. I think the boy was nervous-his first day at intermediate school, and my daughter, who got to celebrate her 9th birthday by going back to school...ughh, I think was looking forward to it.

learning to whittle

I have to admit that while settling into a new, much quieter, routine working from home is going to have some benefits, I had some uneasiness sending the boy off to that next stage of his life, and knowing my baby girl was turning 9 today pretty much did me in......especially when my wife sent a message that she was a teary-eyed mess after dropping the kids off. Hmm...what's changed?

This summer was rough, both emotionally and because our schedules seemed to be packed full of something going on all the time. We wrapped up our vacation last week and presto-the summer was over. Maybe it is all of the gray hairs I seem to have gotten over the last two years, the occaisonal aches and pains, too many funerals this summer, a high sense of weariness of the world around me, or knowing that my kids are growing up way too fast.....but it seemed to hit me hard today.

I pray that my kids do well. That they cling to God every step of the way and not let others define who they are. But mostly I pray that I don't screw them up too badly as we continue to move, quickly, through this life. The one thing that I've tried to do, having felt this way for a while now, is find an opportunity to grab both my kids together and give them a big hug and say that I have the best kids in the world and that I love them. It's about all we can do.