When the fall of 2020 came, rather than risk all those dreaded zooms again, I pulled my youngest out of her school and have since been homeschooling her instead.
In the beginning I thought it would be more temporary, because, let’s face it,
I know myself.
I’m not cut out for it like some folks are.
I’m much more rap in the drop-off line than the sourdough starter type.
You know, sometimes I call the trampoline “P.E.”
But, just my luck, my daughter loved it, and having all that extra time to play, and that is how we are still homeschooling.
This is now year 2.
It’s common these days to see her doing science while she wears a disguise.
My little Mowgli has flourished with the absence of some of the pressure, like, having to always wear pants every day.
It’s a good thing I’ve known the homeschool coordinator for a long time, though,
otherwise I’m sure there would be lots of note-taking, and a side-eye to things like me leaping up in the middle of today’s meeting on how homeschooling is going, and hollering to my 10 year old, Paige,
“PAIGE, THE GATE GOT LEFT OPEN,
AND I JUST WATCHED THE COW RUN BY!
HE RAN BY THE MINIATURE ROLLER-COASTER I GOT ON MARKETPLACE, AND NOW HE’S IN THE FIRE PIT,”
and having her, then, run out of the house barefoot to wrangle him, holding one of those highly realistic looking Reborn dolls only by its hair.
The coordinator watched her rounding the house in a flash, dashing out into the field, dangling what looked like lifeless baby legs, and nervously shifted in her seat and asked, with a pleading expression,
“That wasn’t a…REAL baby, was it?”
I think I saw sweat bead on her lip.
I laughed, but realized she was actually waiting for an answer.
I mean, around here, I guess that question does seem fair.
She knows I also do daycare.
Paige looked like she hadn’t bathed since the fall of last year;
Like she came straight from the headlines about a girl found living chained underneath the porch stairs.
I quickly pulled out a stack of work we’d done in the last week, and silently pushed it across the hot tub we were using instead of a table, because we’re real high-class.
Distracted her with all that literature.
See? *taps the stack*
Even threw a spelling test in there.
$20 says that coordinator starts a file on us today that includes the bold sharpied words
“Do not re-admit to the school.”
That coordinator has seen a lot on her visiting days that happen once a week.
She stopped even asking how fourth grade math is going after the “Estimation Incident.”
She just does like a therapist, and waits for me to bring my trauma up.
I guess she can see EXACTLY how it’s all going…
My wild-headed girl out zig-zagging through the tall grass.
It’s going about how the last two years have gone.
*a cow moos in the backyard of a duplex*
We’re kind of winging it, you could say.
Where the work log I turn in says “extracurricular,”
I’m going to start writing “Banjo music” on the sheet.
GrEeN fAmiLy HoMEskulE.
Our uniform is coonskin, and
What you see is what you get.
We’ve got cows, and roller coasters,
And, no,
That baby isn’t real or dead.
Mom Outnumbered
Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.
