It’s always a hurricane of stress and anxiety at the end of the school year. So many big feelings, so many big emotions and so. many. activities.
I took my therapist’s advice and instead of having all of the dates and commitments rolling around in my head with no tether to reality, I filled out the calendar book i’ve been carrying to and from work for the past eight months. In doing this I realized that my son’s band concert tomorrow night will, in fact, be his last school band concert ever. He is a Junior, but will be off campus for half of his day next year earning college credits. This means no band class as a senior.
So tomorrow night is his last school concert. I’m sitting at work willing myself not to cry. Thankfully, my other little cherub is in band, so hopefully we can continue to trick ourselves into feeling cultured going to their band concerts.
This time of year is the epitome of that saying, “I had a lot to do today so …. I took a nap.” The end of the school year is always busy with my oldest’s birthday combined with all the big feels of finishing up a grade for the kids. My oldest is always thrilled to be done, but my big hearted youngest who is one big emotion always gets sad. Moreso this year because it’s their last year in elementary school. They are off to big scary 7th grade middle school next year. Despite my working in middle school and literally graduating up last year with my student and their classmates from 6th into 7th and seeing the transition firsthand, there’s nothing I can say to convince my own kid they will be so happy and love middle school. As with most other life experiences for them, I just get in, put on my seatbelt and steel myself for the ride.
The older i’ve gotten, the easier it’s been to manage change. I was never good at it and always had emotional reactions to it, but my life has had lots and lots of it. I feel like i’ve gone through a crash course with how much we’ve moved and how many jobs i’ve had and all the experiences of just being a parent. It’s sort of forced on you and you can either flow with it and manage, or be a big puddle on the ground all the time.
For me, I like to choose my ground tantrum, big emotion moments wisely. It usually ends with me covered in chips and salsa and a stomach ache. We all have our coping mechanisms.
I am happy to have a vacation on the calenar to look forward to. My youngest and I are going on a 5 day trip to many fun places and we leave the day after school is out. Funny to think a wild vacation involving two different amusement parks will be relaxing, but there ya have it. That’s saying something about the May-June crunch. Where days are months-long but the weeks are a blink of an eye.
Sarcasmica 