Saturday, December 09, 2006

Terror in the mailbox


My wife and I have received a truly terrifying letter. The first sentence:

"The purposes of this letter are to invite you to our annual Open House and Orientation for Parents and to provide you information about the course selection process in the weeks ahead with activities planned for your sons/daughters that will help ease their transition to E.O. Smith High School. "

What bothered us so much? It isn’t the rampant use of passive voice and prepositions by my son’s future educators (though, this was disturbing). Instead…

My son is going to high school next year!

This is so wrong. He’s still my little boy who I chase around the house to tickle, who likes to climb trees, who I tuck in at night, who kisses me good-bye when either of us leaves the house. Just yesterday, it seems, he slept in my arms while I studied for graduate school area exams, took all his stuffed animals to sleep overs, and ran from room to room just for fun.

When I think about the pain, confusion, and many, many difficulties that I experienced and witnessed in high school, I would give anything to spare my son from them.

But I also remember the fun, memories, friends and growth, and I want all of those and more for him.

I feel like someone in a roller coaster car that has climbed to the top of the first peak and has paused, ready to plummet: I am very scared.

3 comments:

Knumb said...

I'm glad J-man is big enough to avoid all the melvins I got my freshman year.

Boy, I can't believe he's a teen.

Bad Runner said...

I know what you mean, Brad. My little guy isn't quite ready for high school yet, but he excitedly showed me his first signs of facial hairs last night announcing that he's "becoming a man..." Wh-wh-what? Well, at least I can say that if he's is, he's becoming a awfully good one.

Brad Wright said...

Oh dear, you mean that more changes are ahead? Last night Cathy and I had talked about whether my son's voice is starting to change...