(not my proudest) Parenting Moment

So, this morning Luke got himself dressed all by himself, as he usually does, but not without some griping. You see, we went to NH the weekend before last for apple picking, and then last weekend I had my class so I had to be in Massachusetts all day both Saturday and Sunday. Tina HAD worked on our mountain of laundry, but it's such a daunting task...it's amazing to me how much effort goes into doing a family of four's laundry. It's just incomprehensible. Anyway, long story short there was only one pair of pants left in Luke's drawer, and they were a pair he's NEVER worn. Nothing wrong with them, just not his usual style. They kind of needed to be ironed, too, but I don't even iron for me, much less a five year old. He grabbed a stripey long-sleeve shirt that sort of matched and was way too big for him, so he looked a little lost in it, but really, not a bad outfit for the last clean outfit. He told me tomorrow he would have to wear shorts (!) but I told him I'm wash all his pants and put them in his drawer before tomorrow.

So then we all climb into the mini-van—quite a production. Tina and I and Teo and Lucy (because we go for a power walk after we drop off the Kindergarteners) and Luke and Max. We get to school and Teen heads off to the track with Lucy so she won't jump on elementary school kids, and I bring Luke and Max over to their classroom. While we're waiting there, Max keeps asking me to help him take off his sweatshirt and put it in his backpack. I ask him, "Don't you want to wait until you get inside? It's pretty cold out here. Look, I can see my breath..." and then I get all into showing him how I can see my breath, which is still a pretty delightful phenomenon to me even after 36 years of it. So Max says to me, "My mom said I have to take it off because it won't look good in the picture."

In the middle of my "see my breath" revery this tries to register. Picture? What picture? I look around and see all the kids with shining faces, many of the girls in dresses, the boys in crisp, ironed button-downs, and moms saying, Don't forget to smile big for the camera!" Camera? Picture? School picture day! It's school picture day!

I am a rotten parent. I am a terrible, disorganized, clueless, awful parent. What the hell, I have a million great pictures of my kid. Tina takes pictures a hundred times better than those stupid school portraits. But do you remember your own kindergarten school picture, how iconic those six years of school photos became. It doesn't matter how good (or bad) the photographer is, or the cheesiness of the backdrop. If anything, the cheesier the better.

As Tina, Teo and Lucy and I power walk around the track, two photographers (presumably), laden with many bags, make their way across the track and into the middle of the soccer field and start setting up right there where we have to circle them (oval them?) to add to my shame. This makes it kind of hard to stop thinking about picture day. So I decide when we get home, I'll fill out the order form and run it back to school so Luke will have his order form in time. We jet home, frankly before we've really walked as far as we should have, because I'm impatient to get this done. We throw Lucy in the back of the car, load up Teo and head home, where I choose a picture plan and write my check. As I'm heading out the door, it occurs to me. I'm paying thirty bucks for this, I want the kid in a nice shirt. I'm risking getting a reputation at school for being one of the wacky parents, one of the kind of crazy ones that really ought to get a job, but I do it any way.

I race out to the mini-van and start to back out of the driveway. It's when I turn my head around to see out the back window that I notice Lucy sitting quietly back there. In the excitement, we had completely forgotten her in the van! I stop the car, run her to the back yard, and then head out again.

On my way to the door of the school, I investigate the button-down I've chosen and notice that it still has a consignment-store tag in it, and I rip that out and pocket it. Then I throw myself at the mercy of the school secretary. She tells me to put on a "visitor" sticker and head to his classroom. I'm trying to picture how I'm going to gracefully interrupt the entire class so I can give the teacher my order form and undress, and then redress my kid, when for the first time today God smiles on a witless, unprepared parent, and Luke comes trotting around the corner on his way to the office with Ryan. Ryan, it seems, is today's special helper, who delivers the "day's news" to the office, and gets to pick one friend to go with him. It seems that today Ryan chose Luke as his one friend. Score! I follow the boys into the office and whip Luke's shirt off, dress him and tuck him and check his face and hair. I make him promise he'll keep his good shirt on (he has a t-shirt underneath) and take his huge plastic watch off when it's picture time. Then I give him the order form and tell him to give it to his teacher. He and Ryan take off happily and my mission is accomplished.

At the end of the day when I'm picking up Luke, I run into one of the moms I hang out with at school who has twins in Kinergarten, who also forgot it was picture day today. I told her what I did and she said she also considered bringing shirts to school but decided against it because she didn't want to be known as the "crazy mom" who needs to get a job. Oh well. There goes my reputation. Hopefully I can turn it around a bit when I chaperone the apple orchard field trip at the end of the month.