I Blog Because of Peer Pressure: Tomorrow

I think it is because we are night people, my little family, but to me, there is always so much more emotion in the night before an event, and the day of, it seems just a little more calm and easy. This also could be because of the anxiety, just a bit, but here I sit, the night before Kindergarten, and the butterflies, they are big ones.

I am not worried about my kids. I am not worried about them learning, about making friends, about enjoying school. I am not worried that they will come home sad, or feel discouraged or forget to eat their lunch or lose a shoe on the bus. They are independent, they are smart, and they are going to rock Kindergarten. They are ready. They are going to be fine.

But.

I know what kids are like. Other kids. And I worry that my little ones, my babies will be caught up in a new world without me. One where kids can be mean, that has bullies, or mean girls, or that kid that ruins Christmas this year. I worry that they will have bad experiences that they might not even know take a little bitty bit of their babyhood away from me. That it won't be long before Ben doesn't want to hold my hand in public, or Maggie keeps secrets. That snuggling, and calling me Mommy, and wanting me to know everything is going to start to pass me by. I know there is a long time between here and their senior year of high school, but this is the beginning. They meet friends that they may like, love, hate, forget, or remember 30 years later who that weird kid was who said they would get married someday (mine was Joey). I worry that they will change, that they will get sassier, learn new phrases, want to watch different shows on TV. I know that there is a long time to progress from 5-18, but that gap seems smaller to me as soon as they get on the bus tomorrow.

I want them to be brave. I want them to be good friends, to watch over kids who might be hurting. My empathetic Maggie? Not to worry. Tonight, as I was tucking her in and giving her a bit too long I guess hug, she asked if I was going to miss her tomorrow. I said yes, and so she said "Then I will give you a hundreds of kisses" and then kissed me all over my starting to tear up face, told me she would miss me too, and that she would blow me a kiss from school that I better catch. My intuitive little worrier Ben? That will be his job, to worry about his classmates. I can ask him everyday, I am sure, if there was a kid who needed a friend and hear about who it was. I just hope he will choose courage, and be a friend to someone who needs one, and to make friends who appreciate his loving heart.

Tonight at bedtime, I didn't have the right books. I realized that all summer long, I had wanted to get them thematically appropriate books about starting school. To calm nerves, and explain to them what it will be like in school. I couldn't find anything appropriate in our house. I wish I had been more organized. I wish my back to school station had something printed in it, or the right kind of catch alls for things like box tops and bookbags. I wish I had labels for their stuff, that I knew the right answers to questions like "where do you put the snack?" and "Is this sign from Pinterest the perfect one for the photos?" Or "will they eat more if I cut it into cute shapes?"

I have a haphazard lunch plan that doesn't make me feel good in the Bento Box inspired Pinterest world I live in. Their first day, their big day, I let Daddy pack them, and feel a little (or a lot) of anxiety that it isn't good enough. There is a part of me that feels like a note should go in there, but then I remember that they can't read, so that seems stupid. I don't know where we will take those first day of school pictures. I don't know if they will be scared, happy, or crying in the morning.

I filled out 24 pieces of paper about starting school. They even signed Internet use forms with their little shaky signatures. This is real. These papers go in real places, in files that will still be with them years from now. How will they change? How will they look to us in the future? (Going right now to scan the page I filled out for each of them!)

I feel like tomorrow I am sending them out to a big bad world. Please let the other kids be kind. Let them find friends who are like them, who care, and love and are innocent about words that are badder than "poop". Maggie can't wait to learn how to read. May her love of learning never fade. Ben is excited for recess. Let him find friends to play with who will be kind, and fun, and like things like dragons and minions.

Tonight I need to go to bed. There is a lot to do tomorrow, a crazy morning to get ready to go, and a meeting with the preschool about the next one that I will worry for twice as much. Tomorrow I will be strong, I will be brave, I will be kind, and I will be ready, so ready, to punch anyone in the nose who changes my babies for the worst.