This morning–the LAST! DAY! OF! SCHOOL!–dawned cheerful and bright, and I realized that for all of my careful end-of-year organization and preparation, somehow, I hadn’t procured a gift for the bus driver.

This was a problem. Not only do we have the only bus driver in the history of elementary schools who actually LIKES and is GOOD WITH small children, I’m pretty sure she spends her entire (meager, no doubt) salary on treats for the kids. The woman deserves canonization, really, but I usually settle for a small gift.

What to do, what to do. Oh! A Dunkin Donuts gift card! Know what else they have at Dunkin Donuts? DONUTS! For breakfast! Because I am SMART. And masochistic.

We piled into the car and got a gift card and donuts with frosting and sprinkles. Let me tell you, I was a VERY popular lady this morning. I’ve always said there is no better way to start out a day of learning than with a pound of sugar and preservatives. But who are we kidding; there wasn’t going to be any learning today.

Chickadee bounced onto the bus and thrust the card at the driver, then flung herself into a seat and succumbed to a diabetic coma. I mean, I assume. I was busy riding her scooter back over to our house from the bus stop, so I don’t really know.

Monkey ran laps around the house while I did some work, and after a while I announced that it was time to Go Outside. This ruling was greeted with glee until Monkey discovered that:
1) it was hot out
and
2) rather than catching bugs with him, I would selfishly be mowing the lawn.

I was no longer Cool Donut Mama, I was now Boring Mowing Mama. Rather than allow me to just mow the lawn as quickly as possible, Monkey felt it was necessary to head my way, arms flailing, mouth moving, several times. I would turn the mower off only to be told “I’m hot,” or “it’s boring without Chickie,” or–my personal favorite–“It’s too buggy!” (In case you’re wondering why that’s my favorite–he was holding the bug magnifying glass in one hand and the bug-catching contraption in the other. He’d been, you know, CATCHING BUGS. But it was TOO BUGGY.)

We did have a few good minutes out there. I let him help me take apart our big plastic climber (which the kids are really too big for, now), and that was sort of fun. Also I brought him a ginormous toad I almost ran over with the mower, at one point, and he followed it around the yard for a bit and gleefully reported that it stuck its tongue right out and ate a bug! For some reason he was not enthused at my suggestion that he just put the toad on his head to be his personal bug deterrent system, though.

After lunch, I started thinking about how Chickadee would be bringing home her class assignment for next year, and I still really didn’t know when we’d find out about Monkey’s placement, so I decided I’d call the school to ask when we’d been finding out.

Please note: I did NOT call the school to ask WHAT his assignment was. In our school district, class assignments are slightly better-guarded than military secrets. I don’t know why. But I do know that every year it’s a huge to-do, and every year we’re told we may not request specific teachers, we should not ask about assignments until they’re sent home, etc. Well. I knew that existing students were getting their assignments today. So I thought I’d just ask when we’d be hearing about Monkey.

Three people later, I have Someone Important on the phone, and she is clearly not having a good day. I was pleasant, I was not demanding; in fact, I apologized for even bothering her, but just wanted to be able to give him an estimate arrival time, seeing as how his sister would have news today. “WELL,” I was huffily informed, “we haven’t even STARTED the assignments for the new incoming first graders.”

There was a pause, during which I felt the earth’s rotation slow.

“Excuse me?”

“We haven’t started doing the assignments yet.” Okay, so I hadn’t heard wrong. But…? No, I must be misunderstanding.

“Ummmm… I’m sorry. I don’t understand. How is that possible? There are kindergarteners who were sent home with class assignments today. Clearly you HAVE done the class assignments…?”

“No, not for students who aren’t already in the school. We take care of our own, first. FIRST we allocate the kindergarteners who are already here. THEN we work on the incoming kindergarteners. When ALL OF THAT is done, we move on to the private school kindergarteners.” Lady, you are wasting my time, was the subtext.

“Wait. You don’t…” I struggled for the words. I didn’t want to make this woman any angrier–if indeed, that was possible–but surely I missing something. “You don’t just consider the entire pool of first graders in one group? You assign the kids you have, and then whatever’s LEFT, the other kids get?”

“Well… no. That’s not it at all.” Now she was really starting to hate me, because I was not UNDERSTANDING how LOGICAL she was being. “We have to take care of our own, first,” she said again. “The children who are ALREADY HERE.”

Right. Their own. Because I haven’t been paying this town’s outrageous taxes nor participating in the PTA and volunteering in the school. Nor did I save the district an entire year’s worth of expenses by sending my child to a private school during a year in which he was entitled to a (crappy, half-day) public education.

I don’t know; the entire thing just really rubbed me the wrong way. Our school district has some quirks wherein there are two very different settings for our first graders (which is a whole ‘nother rant for another time), and neither setting is necessarily better than the other, but they are very different. Parents are allowed to state a case for one environment over the other–though not to request a specific teacher!–and in Monkey’s case, I did do that. I agonized over a letter I wrote prior to registration, many months ago. This woman wouldn’t even confirm whether or not anyone had READ that letter yet. Or whether it would be granted any sort of weight whatsoever.

And I hate to be THAT PERSON who starts ranting about public servants, but ya know, I’M THE PUBLIC. SERVE ME. At the very least, don’t act like my kid is gum stuck to your shoe. Sheesh.

So by the time Chickadee got off the bus, I’d been on the phone with a bunch of other parents, trying to figure out if I was overreacting or if this whole “taking care of our own” system was utter bullshit.

And then! She got off the bus! And we stood there in the yard and opened her report card and found her new teacher assignment and she was thrilled! And I was relieved!

And then the madness began.

She had to call all of her friends! And see who they had! But some of them weren’t home, so she left messages! And then we discovered a current classmate who will be in next year’s class. Hallelujah. I tried to convince her to stop calling, then, because odds are she’d only have one old classmate in the new class. But no! More calls! More squealing and giggling!

I had a terrifying glimpse into my future, there, as my daughter lounged in a chair with a leg slung up over the arm, yakking on the phone. Hold me.

Eventually it was time for the kids to head off with Daddy for a bit, and I was left with explicit instructions as to what to do when her other friends called back. She called twice while they were gone, to check. And I had several interesting conversations while she was away, too.

Me: Hello?
Girl: HellothisisGirlisChickadeethere?
Me: I’m sorry, sweetie, she’s at her dad’s. Can I take a message for her?
Girl: Yes.
Me: And you would like me to tell her…?
Girl: Ummmmmm.
Me: Okay. How about you tell me what teacher you got for third grade?
Girl: Oh! I got Mrs. Soandso.
Me: Okay, Chickie will be disappointed you’re not in the same class, but I hear Mrs. Soandso is really nice. I’ll let Chickie know you called. She’ll probably call you back tomorrow. Okay?
Girl: Okay!
Me: Anything else?
Girl: Ummmmmm.
Me: Okay, honey, she’ll call you tomorrow. Bye!
Girl: Bye!

By the time Chickadee returned, we’d found three friends who’d be joining her in her new class. This put her in such a jovial mood, when I sent the kids upstairs to get ready for bed, for several minutes all I could hear was Monkey laughing hysterically. I don’t know what she was doing to him. I probably don’t want to know. Eventually they ricocheted off the walls and each other enough times that they landed in their pajamas and then their beds.

Monkey kissed me and rolled over onto his stomach to sleep.

Chickadee wanted to KEEP CHATTING. Because lord knows, there had not been enough with the talking, yet. She wanted to know what we would do tomorrow, on our first official day of summer vacation. I named a few errands. Musing aloud, I remembered that I need to order new birth certificates for the kids, as theirs have gone missing. And Monkey isn’t officially allowed to enter school until I present his birth certificate.

“Why do you need THAT?” Chickadee asked me.

“I don’t know, honey. They just want to be sure that you kids are who I say you are, and that you belong with me, and that you’re American citizens, I think.” Honestly, I was guessing. I have no idea why they need to see his birth certificate. Maybe in case he’s actually 40 and not 6?

“What if he WASN’T an American citizen?” she asked.

“Hmmmm. Good question! You know what, I’m not sure.” I was feeling more and more idiotic by the moment. Also I really wanted to just have some SILENCE. I didn’t want to discuss the finer points of birth certificate presentation. I wanted her to go to sleep and BE QUIET.

“What if he was born in another country?” she pressed.

“I just told you, sweetie, I don’t know.”

“What if he was born ON PLUTO?”

I was still laughing when I got back downstairs. All that noise… it’s worth the headache, I think.