It didn’t hurt that the media erasure of Warren seemed to (at least temporarily) roll back ever so slightly after she slayed in the debate. I’m starting to see male friends start to post about her being their candidate on FB, and women empowered to publicly state that they don’t like Bernie, which would have been impossible before. The sexism is real, yo.
Yesterday I volunteered to chaperone Bobby’s field trip to the zoo. He’s very much wanted me to be involved with his school stuff, and I have been obliging. In this instance, I was unaware that we’d be required to lead a group of kids (in this case, just Bobby and one other boy) through the zoo alone, which is pretty much my worst nightmare. I was profoundly uncomfortable taking charge of a strange kid and having to field his request for treats and toys...and being responsible for his finishing the assignment they were given, making sure he eats, goes to the bathroom, etc. But I just told myself to do the best I could, and thankfully he was a friendly kid who chuckled when I sang “coooold pockets!” when he took out a Hot Pocket for lunch. So...I think I did ok...? Nobody lost a limb or disappeared and everyone was delivered safely to the bus at the end of the day. But boy oh boy is that sort of thing out of my comfort zone. Apparently eight years of parenting has not removed my intense awkwardness around children.
Bobby is taking some sort of standardized test next month which, according to the other parents at the zoo, determines which kids are “gifted” and sets them up for different tracks from now on. It’s pretty nerve-wracking, but I’m going to try to hide my feelings about it so Bobby doesn’t pick up on my anxiety. Will he be labeled gifted? I don’t know...I kind of don’t think so. I mean, he’s a smart kid who so far has done well academically, but is he doing better than the other kids? Probably not. I once asked for average kids and I believe I got them. They seem to hang in the middle of the pack much of the time - which is a good place to be. It’ll be interesting to see how that pans out.
Funny, same thing was going on for me last week. I was feeling down about... everything. Got my period and now, despite the fact that none of the things I was down about have changed, I feel better. I also had your same experience chaperoning a field trip to the zoo, except that it was a group of five girls. I spent the afternoon repeatedly counting to five as they swirled around me like insane electrons. Amazing that I managed not to lose any of them. Good luck to Bobby with the GT testing.
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