Day One

At 6:48 this morning I woke to the bleary sounds of Frances asking for me from her bedroom. I found her sitting on the floor beside her bed in her ballerina nightgown (as pink and lovely as if she had never bled all over it), smiling, her hair mussed and tangled.

"Good morning, sweet girl."

"Good morning, Mummy. Is it morning time?"

"It sure is. Do you want to snuggle in the big bed for a few minutes?"

"Yeah!"

I wrapped us both in the blankets and Frances played with the baby mole. "Can I watch some TV while I eat my minigo?"

"No, sweetie. No time this morning. We have to get you ready for school."

"But I don't want to go to school. I want to stay home!"

"I know. But you have to go to school, and I have to go to work. In a minute we're going to get up and get dressed."

"So we can play?"

"No, honey. So you can go to school."

"But I don't want to go to school."

"I know."

Rinse, repeat.

Just before seven we got up, and I dressed her in her long-sleeved light-pink shirt with a horse on it (she picked it herself--"it's the same colour as my nightgown!"), and a pair of brown leggings with light-pink flowers on them, and her brown suede mary-janes. With the tangles combed out of her hair she was the most adorable big-school girl I'd ever seen. She ate two minigos and half a banana while I packed my lunch and her snack and my work bag, and brushed my teeth and even actually put on make-up. Then we put on her raincoat ("you have to pull up the hood so my hair won't get wet") and my jacket and out we went. The rain had stopped but there were many large and interesting puddles on the bike path behind our house.

"Come on, sweetie."

"I AM coming," she'd say, as she dawdled and splashed, zig-zagged over the path.

"OK. Can you come a little faster?"

"I don't want to come faster. I want to come slow." And she did. What is a five-minute walk for me when she's in the stroller is over ten when she walks; but I'd left the stroller outside last night and it is too wet to be used this morning. So she dawdles, and I try to find the joy in the sight of her little splashing feet, her wee head in the raincoat, her smile. We walk slowly. At least, until she sees that my jacket sleeves are so long that they cover my hands, and she wants to catch them! So now the chase is on. Can she catch my hands? Oh, she caught them. But wait, now she's running; can I catch her? No, I can't, she's running too fast, look how fast she's running! She giggles. "You can't catch me, Mummy!"

She walks all the way to school by herself, and we go into her classroom, hang up her coat, put her rainboots underneath in case they go outside later on, put her lunch bag on the floor beside her boots for kindergarten this afternoon. I leave her with an interesting toy; she cries a little on my way out the door, but I know she will be ok.

A walk to the subway, a wait, a short ride, a walk to my office; I am at my desk by 8:30. Not bad. I'll leave to pick her up at 5:20. It will be a long day for my wee girl, and for me. But so far, so good.

Posted by Andrea at September 11, 2007 9:23 AM under Decision 2007

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