Miles – 2005
I say every mother needs to trust her heart-gut. She knows, I say. It’s hidden inside her, the answer. Answers to all the many many questions that rise up, all day every day.
We’ve made our decisions about Miles and school after years of wrestling with homeschooling versus public or private out-of-home schooling. We made the decision to have him not start school at all last year, after doing more heart-gut wrestling. So now here we are. We’ve made our decisions and I even feel good about them, as good as I can feel when every decision we make always has its right and wrong parts. This boy is going to full-time-is-the-only-option kindergarten at a public school next week.
{Rain photo circa 2007}
Mothers dream of a person and then grow them in their very soul and bring them here and then release them with a great push. Unleashed with such love-pain, they go, realeased. It is at the very beginning we start letting go because that’s what our bodies need to do. We have no choice and then it goes, the current rushing wildly on toward all the letting go of all the future things.
This first day of school feels like the second big push. Like I’m sitting on the shore and shoving my baby away in a basket. It’s not that dramatic or final, of course, but in my heart it feels that way. And even though I know it’s going to be alright with all of its right and wrong parts, like birth, it’s painful. He will be gone so many hours of the day, out of my watchful eye with a thousand things happening that I’ll never experience with him, never know about, for years to come. This is good, and so different than now.
It’s a fine balance for my heart, this mothering job with two opposite parts–to hold, protect, keep close, attach and love while also letting go with one great push and release after another.
One day Miles will take the keys to the car and the keys to the heart of someone he falls for. He’ll go. Starting school is a speeding of the current toward all of these things. That’s what it feels like, anyway. And even though my desire to make it all stop and keep him under my wing is strong, it’s wrong. It is born of love but based in fear and so I choose excitement and joy for him. I choose to watch him unfold with great anticipation. I choose to let go of fear after I feel it and look at it for what it is and then release it. I have to choose.
I could never be ready for this; I’d rather selfishly tether him to my arm. But my heart-gut tells me to give a great push and so I will. My boy is going to school. There he goes with my heart, with one of the keys to my heart. He will always go and he will always take some of me with him.
{ 27 comments }
I remember vividly what this first day of Kindergarten was like for Weston and I. It was two years ago now and things have gotten easier.. but it’s still a littlle hard to send him off to 2nd grade this year. Each step is another release. Last year 1st grade was his first year of “full day” school. SO. MANY. HOURS. AWAY! and this year he gets to starts things like the After School Science Club and he will make his first communion at church. The milestones keep coming, the independence stronger …….my immediate reaction to grip tighter but I know it’s best for him….. Even though it’s hard for us both.
oh you made me cry.
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How beautifully written. My daughter starts first grade on Tuesday after doing half day kindergarten next year. I know your feelings all too well. I only hope my shy little flower flourishes away from me, her (over)protective mother.
Oops, meant last year of course, not next.
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Oh Heather- I’ve been waiting to read this post. Hold it close to my heart, and share my tears for my own heart-gut decisions. Your photos, your words- they’re gems. XO
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I’m right there with you. My first born started high school and my youngest started kindergarten. Both were so incredibly hard. Watching my now semi-grown son walk off on his own almost killed me. Every glance I stole I had to blink away tears because I kept seeing the three year old I drove to preschool over 10 years before.
This is the best off-to-kindergarten post I’ve read so far. It’s so true and so beautiful.
I’m lucky in that my 3-year-old is going to preschool two full days a week (while I work), but the classroom has webcams. One of my facebook friends said he thought it was creepy, but somehow I’m just not ready to send him off without being able to peek here and there throughout the day to know he is fine without me. I have two years to work up to that, right?
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Wow….what I would give for webcams in my kiddos classroom. I love it and am simultaneously super jealous. :)
I just had a realization in all of this thinking about school…..I was thinking back to when Zach went to his first day of school and I cried because it felt like I was letting go of part of my heart. And then I was thinking about how all of a sudden Miles is going to his first day and now Zach is a 7th grader and how fast it flew by. Then my thoughts jumped to when Elsie has her first day of kindergarten Zach will be graduated!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Good grief! Parts of my heart all over the place……thanks for putting feelings into words and for doing it so well. I love you my little sister….Amazing mom and writer that you are!!!!
From Finding Nemo:
Marlin: I promised I’d never let anything happen to him.
Dory: Hmm. That’s a funny thing to promise.
Marlin: What?
Dory: Well, you can’t never let anything happen to him. Then nothing would ever happen to him.
It’s a hard line to tread.
So true… a hard balance…that line gets me everytime.
Hugs my friend. Sending my eldest to kindy was one of my hardest days. ..until she came home with the biggest smile about seven hours later. I now get strangely excited for each passing school year for my kids. Thinking about you. xoxo
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Oh, Heather… this is the cry of a mother’s heart as she shoots her little arrow into the world. This is what we do, isn’t it? We prepare them for this, and we hope that we have prepared our hearts, too.
Lovely post.
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That was so beautiful! I have a little girl that starts kindergarten next week and it’s a very exciting, yet sad time. My kids all go to public school and we are very happy with our schools. There are some amazing teachers and administrators in the public schools!
Oh Heather…I am sobbing. My sweet girl starts kindergarten on Tuesday and I am beside myself with feelings of sadness. Once again, your beautiful and carefully chosen words mirror what is in my heart and what I have been trying to articulate but only come out as tears instead. As soon as I am done typing this, I am going to walk my laptop over to my hubby and say, “Here! This is what my irritability and tear stained cheeks have been trying to explain to you this past week!” Thank you for your gift of articulating all of the hurting pieces of my mama heart today.
My prayers for you and Miles as you both start this amazing journey.
Beautiful metaphor. It is so hard to let them out into the world. It is painful and fierce and frightening. And yet, sooner or later they must go. And you know. You know.
My baby (also a 2005 kid) started last year. Oh, the hours away, how cruel. The world that I could not be part of. And yet, if there is one thing I want for my girl it’s having her own world and the confidence to walk in it. Midyear, I started going to lunch with her. I could put names to faces and had a glimpse, which helped me so very much.
Last night, we had back to school, and this year in first grade, she has a wonderful experienced teacher who understands kindly and lovingly. She showed me she knows my girl. There is no gift I want more.
Yes. Yes to all of this. Miss M. left this week for kindy (10-3) and that first day felt so empty and lonely, but she had the best time, so I couldn’t really be sad. Hope Miles has a wonderful time as well.
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Yes, this is the truth. My first born – he starts full time kindergarten at public school as well next week. And I bear down and hold hands of all the mothers who’ve gone before and I know it is good and right and he will breathe deep gulps of this new life stage and love it. Thank you for this beautiful picture. Just a wonder.
O yes I am right here with you on this one! We decided (after much debating and fretting) to send Sami to all-day public school kindergarten too. Her first day was Friday. We both cried. I already hate school. :-(
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Yay dude. Exactly. ALL of this. EXACTLY. And I love the line about the desire to keep him under your wing is so strong but so wrong. THAT to me is the crux of this motherhood thing….the knowing that under the wing is cool and all but really where it’s at is the knowing that our kids do not want to live there. This second big pushing out into kindergarten is so damn true my friend. His life begins. Truly. His friends…all of the things you will now never know as he has a million interactions that are no longer supervised by you. I felt this exact way with Claire….it’s all so big and crazy and a rushing current.
But you are such an awesome mama….and all will be good in the end….ride the wave sister. And keep writing about it. :-)
xo
Lee
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I had such anxiety taking Deklan to his first day of Kindergarten – now he’s in grade 7 CRAZY! I remember I bawled, and didn’t want to leave, he finally came over to me and asked me to go. I was okay with Piper going to school I don’t know why, I guess because Deklan had done it just fine the year before? I simply took her to school, enjoyed the little breakfast and assembly and then kissed her on the head and left. When it came time for Kai to go to school, I bawled again. I think because I realized he was the last one I’d be taking to Kindergarten for the first time. But now he’s in grade three and I’ve realized that there’s going to be oh so many “Firsts” for me to enjoy with all three of them, it doesn’t really stop and for that I’m grateful.
When my son started pre-school, parents were encouraged to hang around as long as our kids wanted us there. Eventually, it was my son who pushed me out the gate. “Go,” he’d say, close to tears. “Don’t talk to anyone.” I couldn’t stand it seeing him that way. I left. The next day, we’d do it again.
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Ohhh it is so hard … thinking ahead … living in the now … daily clinging … daily unclasping … then back to clinging . This beautiful post gripped my heart.
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My Mae Mae just started kindergarten too. You said so beautifully how I have been feeling. I thank you!!
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I am not convinced that all-day kindergarten is the best or even necessary – at least not right away on day one. I speak as an educator, daughter of a fantastic kindergarten teacher, and mother of two girls on the edge of our nest with fluttering wings anticipating their own take off. Just an idea: Only send you child for the morning. Pick them up at lunch. Children don’t even have to legally attend kindergarten let alone a full day. Then when the transition feels right, your child can go for the full day. I am sure the kindergarten teachers out there plan great activities for the full day but do our children have to have everything? Isn’t there a benefit in coming home in the afternoons, back to the nest? I know the trend is for all-day kindergarten with no questions asked but, as hard as it is do things so differently from so many people, it is at least worth considering.
And to Heather, I have only recently stumbled upon your blog and you write how I feel. You are a blessing to me because I often feel alone with my feelings. Thank you for your beautiful gift.
Hi Randi,
Thank you for your kind words about my writing. I appreciate it so much.
And all-day kindergarten–I agree with you, actually. I’m thinking through what I feel about taking him home in the afternoons. I’m curious what the district powers that be would say so I’m going to ask. I don’t say that for my selfish reasons for wanting to keep Miles home. I want to know what my options are so as we take it day by day, I’m well informed. This is another decision that would have right and wrong parts. They all do. We just do the best we can and try to focus on the good. :)
Thank you,
Heather
Hope your son loves his kindergarten experience – it definitely is a big moment for us mamas – sending our babies off to school and letting in a whole new world. It can be amazing but it sure is terrifying.
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