Why doesnt school start AFTER labor day...

This week has seen the start of a new school year. Patrick is now in his second year of highschool and James has started kindergarten... When Patrick was James age I drove him to school each day, remembering the horrors of riding the school bus. He was probably in the seventh or eighth grade before he even rode the bus home from school. He had the standard issue problems on the bus the past few years but nothing as horrific as I faced. He seems fairly unaffected by it all. Now James has voiced an interest in riding the bus. He seems to think it would be a great adventure.

To the best of my recollections the school bus is where I learned all sorts of maniacal behavior, or rather was exposed to it. We see many things take place when our children interact with other kids in settings such as school and daycare. Last year via daycare we lived through the dread poop/booger phase of the five year old psyche... Everything James said revolved around poop and boogers... Given our guilt ridden naive nature we constantly asked ourselves what it was that we had done to bring about such speech from James... Until we started paying attention during the drop off and pick up moments.. Then we learned that it was an infectious thing being spread around the playground... Indeed, one day as I stood off to the side waiting for James to notice me. I was watching him interact with his classmates, I heard all sorts of grand things from all of the children.. Poopy face, booger head, you eat boogers, you eat poop, and the always dread booger butt..

These things always make me wonder what happens to kids when they are at home... The moment took me back to a birthday party we had for Patrick many years ago when he was about James age, My brother had dressed like darth vader for the occasion and made a grand entrance during the candle blowing moment... When he entered the room one of the little kids in attendance barked out, "You come in my room at night and eat me!" That little announcement was met with an awkward silence followed by immediate return to activity as we all pretended not to notice.

So I'm thinking that this year we may try letting James ride the bus and just see what happens. Given the difference in personalities between James and Patrick I think James might be the kid that starts a riot, where Patrick would keep his head down and try to be invisible... As I've said before, we have forgotten about starting a college fund for James and just simply went straight into a "bail James out of jail" fund... The child knows no fear and takes absolutely no shit from anyone or anything. I have watched him rip a branch from a tree that snagged his backpack as he was making his way across the front yard. It took a long while of hanging and beating with various instruments of destruction, but he managed it.. Giving the broken branch a nod of his head when finished as if to say "screw you buddy..." before picking up his gear and heading on.

Knowing these things brings about the double edged sword thing.. On one hand I don't worry too much about him, but on the other hand, you never know which parent or teacher will call with details of the destruction he has wrought...

I am sure the year will be filled the usual amount of total bullshit that comes around with each turn of the calendar. From having to deal with teachers that simply know everything and have a tremendously bad attitude because they are far too underpaid for their obviously superior educational levels (if its that damn bad, try the private sector, where job security is so stable, and you will be paid what you are really worth, or just fired for being a whiny asshole)... to dealing with asinine school rules and policies... Patrick actually had a teacher one year that would not allow the kids to speak out loud in class.. They had a "number system" they had to use if they wanted anything... You held up one finger to sharpen your pencil, two if you had to go the office, three to go to the bathroom and four to ask the teacher a question.. How lame is that? The class had to sit during each day and listen to a "sounds of the sea" cd, as the teacher displayed healing crystals and spent more time telling them about the honeymoon she had over the summer than actually discussing social studies...

As all parents know, there is always one person at the school that is convinced your child is insane, and one that thinks your kid is the next stephen hawking... I just hope James has fun and doesn't pick up too much in the way of things that have to be "unlearned" once he gets home... (no, bill clinton was not the great avenger that saved the world) and we are not losing 25 football fields worth of rain forest every ten seconds...

Patrick will be more geared to when he can start working, and chasing girls than anything else.. so I have little concern for him at the moment...

I just hope it will be quiet, peaceful and filled with vast amounts of happiness... (LOL)