The First Day

                                   

Today was the first day of school. We are pros at this back to school thing by now, this isn't our first rodeo. The big change is that now my kids are at 2 different schools, but we made a deal with the neighbors that I would take their 2 kids to the elementary school and they will bring my oldest to the middle school with their oldest daughter so that we both only have to make one trip.

I was driving home from work yesterday and thinking about the first day of school and I was feeling sad because I wanted to drop my daughter off at the middle school on the first day. I know she wants to go with her friend but it was important to me. As I drove home, I formulated my argument in my head to convince her that she wants me to drop her off on the first day of school. I walked in and I was ready.

I sat down to eat dinner and she turns to me and said, "Mom, can you drive me to school just for tomorrow? It's my first day." You would have thought I won an Oscar.

I was so happy. I said, "Of course." I was trying to be cool about it.

She finished her dinner and went upstairs. I finished but sat at the table afterwards, enjoying a cup of coffee with my husband when my daughter came down, looking frantic with a bloody tissue in her mouth. She was bleeding profusely. She just had her lip tie corrected late last week but had no bleeding. Until now. It literally poured out. We escorted her to the bathroom and she spit a mouthful of blood into the sink. It hit with a SPLASH and flew everywhere around the sink, the faucet, the mirror.

It was like a murder scene. This was my face:

Which, I will tell you - was not reassuring at all to my 10 year old daughter who then began to cry because she was pretty sure, based on the look on my face, that she was going to die. My husband got some water to rinse some of the blood out and another mouthful of blood splashed into the sink. "Let's get some gauze and apply pressure." I called the after hours orthodontist. She sat on the couch and applied pressure. I could see the blood seeping through the side. I pulled my husband into the other room. "Dude, she is bleeding profusely." He rolled his eyes at me. "Stop flipping out, you're flipping her out. It's going to stop bleeding." He is the level headed one. I still googled, "Can you bleed to death from a cut in your mouth?" just to be sure. It stopped bleeding and all was right with the world. But you know what ticked me off? NO ONE from the after hours emergency line called me back. I have paid them THOUSANDS, with an S, of dollars this year and they can't call me back when I call to tell them that my daughter is bleeding heavily from a procedure they preformed? Jerks.

After the bleeding stopped, we got ready for bed. The night before the first day of school was upon us.

This morning the girls woke up early. They put on their first day of school clothes and I made scrambled eggs and a fruit salad for breakfast. My 3rd grader was her usual self. She is not a morning person. My 5th grader took FOREVER to come downstairs. "What were you doing?" "Moisturizing my face and using that anti-pimple cream you bought." Yeah, she's going to the middle school all right. They humored me and we took pictures and then loaded into the car.

I dropped off my little one first. She didn't want me to walk her in. She kissed me at the corner and got out at the front. She waved and walked confidently into school. This is her 4th year there, she's got the routine down.

Then, my oldest daughter and I drove to the middle school. We passed the front of the school and I saw BIG kids in American Eagle shirts, and trendy outfits entering the building. No seer sucker dresses or cute little people. *Sigh* "Do you want me to walk you in?" She laughed like I asked her the most ridiculous question ever. "I think I can figure it out." Well, okay. "Can I hug you or kiss you?" She paused. "No." "Can we shake hands?" She grabbed my hand and put it in hers, and looked at me and said, "I love you, mom." "I love you too." Then I watched her get out and walk into the school. She was almost at the door and she looked back to see if I was still watching her. She smiled.

As I drove away the tears welled up and I was like:

It was a little pathetic. I'm not going to tell my kids about it. Another school year is here...and I have been demoted to hand shaking. Lord give me strength.