Turns Out Kindergarten Roundup Involves No Lassos, Horses, or Even Cookies #Lame

henry and all the other half pints got rounded up for kindergarten last night. we saw the school, met the teachers and principle, and learned all about their learning models and such. the kindergarten teachers seem to be young and kindly and enthusiastic and, i suspect, sort of insane. you'd have to be to make that work.  

rookie mistake, we took henry with us. fortunately, the meeting was held in the library, so he could mostly entertain himself. every once in a while, he'd come up from a book and whisper loudly, YOU GUYS, I'M BORED. CAN WE LEAVE YET? 

lesson: don't take the kids. they don't care about how hardcore your common core is. 

so, anyway. we prepare for kindergarten. big transition, etc, etc. i'm not crying. i mean, saying "i'm not crying" sort of makes it sound like i'm DEFINITELY crying, but i'm actually not. 

i'm feeling less grief over how his blossoming independence impacts me and more excitement for him. he's got that big brain under the floppy hair and i want to see it grow. for him to be able to read on his own and gain bigger control of his emotions as we (mostly) do with practice and time. to make more friends, so have goals and projects and plans. he's just henry'd so well so far, i can't wait to see what comes next. 

there's, of course, more opportunities for hurt and there are always things to fear as his world gets bigger...but we'll try to be brave together and go slowly. 

the other day, he asked me why i turned one way instead of another while i was driving. i started talking about how driving is a constant stream of decisions you have to make: how fast you'll go, what direction you'll take, whether you'll stop for the yellow light, (whether you'll emote with your hands or say words your kids oughtn't hear if someone cuts you off. sumbitch in the Prius, you know who you are). and to be able to make that many decisions, you have to have the skill to assess situations and make good choices w/ the information you have. and that takes practice. 

of course, driving is just an example. every interraction in every relationship is a series of choices. every day, work demands you make a series of choices. every trip to the grocery stores is a (very difficult) series of choices. 

he's getting there. one day at a time. i think kindergarten is an opportunity for lots of practice at making good choices. 

after i totally blabbered for about 5 minutes on all this growth and change and such, he was like, I JUST WANTED TO KNOW WHY YOU WENT THE WRONG WAY TO KARATE CLASS??