The Last Day of School

So my three heathens are officially free for the summer vacation. No more teachers, no more books, no more blah, blah, blah. I'm trying to be happy for them but secretly I'm envious at the thought of 8 entire weeks of freedom spreading out before me. My summer looks like an endless sea of 8-4's. Sigh.

Don't get me wrong, part of me is thrilled at the prospect of summer just because I get to experience it vicariously through my children. I get to relive the joy of fireworks and hot days and swimming and picnics and s'mores. There's always a montage in my head of my own summers complete with fireflies and popsicles and skinned knees. (Of course, their scenarios probably don't involve bikes with banana seats but that's their loss!) I don't have to do assembly line lunch packing for 2 whole months! I don't have to wash socks for two months because they will live barefoot or in flip flops. Summer has it's definite high points.

An even bigger part of me is ecstatic to have no more school events for two months. With three children it seems like I'm spending an awful lot of time in one school or another. (They are all currently in separate grades in separate schools.) And if one kid's got something that week, it seems like they all do. Since I'm trying to be an involved, informed parent, there I am at open houses and conferences and concerts and moving up ceremonies. It's as if this is the parental version of freedom for 8 weeks. Not that I don't enjoy my kids and their performances. It's just that I could enjoy them much more if I wasn't working all day and then coming home and rushing everyone through homework and dinner to make it to an event. (This is a large hint to the lotto fairy who has been ignoring me for the better part of a decade.)

Then reality hits and I have a houseful of bored kids not even 2 weeks into summer. My life is the same old drill of work, cook, clean, rinse, lather and repeat. They have no routine now other than harassing each other and now mom's feeling a little frazzled and contemplating the merits of mimosas just to take the edge off. (Orange juice would totally camouflage the alcohol scent, right?) Mothers everywhere start to wince at the sound of their little angels screechy cries of "Moo-om" and "I'm telling!" with some of them starting to get little tics from Summertime PTSD. Oh yes people, it's real. And it's in every house in American for summer vacation.

This is because, at the beginning of summer, that movie montage of summer scenes reflects your hopes and joys of how you anticipate the next two months will be. But halfway through, when those rose colored glasses have not only been taken off but dropped and smashed under your boot heels? You start to remember the good old days of them being in school. Yeah, sure, you had to make school lunches and remember to pack gym clothes and write check after check because you're the National Bank of Mom, but at least they weren't leaving dirty dishes and making messes and getting the dog riled up so that he sheds even more. (A feat that you hadn't known was possible until those lovely angels of yours showed you that it could actually happen.) You long for a lunch hour without squabbling "he said this, she did that" tattletales. You take up scarfing down chocolate truffles in the garage which you could totally stop if it was a problem but it's not a problem so shut up and give me the dark chocolate and no one will get hurt.

Eventually, everyone survives the summer and before you know it those kids are back in school. Moms everywhere breath a collective sigh and get back to the routines, slowly losing that desperate, wild eyed look of someone who's been through the wringer. And it's good. Until the first time I have three separate events on three different nights in three different schools. Then I start wishing for summer.