Blessed Quarantine - Lost moments

Having two children and being a middle school teacher means that the month of May is usually insane. I mean, there are typically multiple events listed every day of the week. Anyone with kids knows that the end of the school year is busy. Between awards ceremonies, dances, concerts, spring plays, IEP meetings, grades and all the other things that pop up our cup runneth over with things to do. This year was going to be a little easier because all three of us were in the same school so many of those things would apply to all of us at once. There would only be one awards ceremony to attend for example, but with an eighth grader there were going to be some additional things. Those things were going to be special. Every year there is a picnic for the eighth graders and I usually go because I have eighth graders who go, but this year I was going to get to go with my daughter. It was a silly thing and I'm sure she wasn't even thinking about the fact that I would go, but I was.

I was looking forward to several things in the last months of school with all three of us in the building. We tend to do some car ride karaoke on the way to school. I love loud music, especially 80s music, and my kids either enjoy it or go along with it. We sing loudly as we drive to school and are sort of known for blasting our music as we pull into the parking lot. I wanted to have two more months of car ride karaoke with my kids. By the way, my female offspring enjoys this aspect of our ride way more than my male offspring.

There are things not related to my own children that I was looking forward to, as well. The principal of our school has been my administrator for 12 of the last 14 years. He is an incredible person and a wonderful leader. I'm not saying we always see eye to eye, but he has always had my back no matter how crazy my idea was. He gets me. He announced earlier this year that he is retiring after this school year. He's been in education for thirty years, so it was not a shock, but it's not what I wanted to hear. If you're a teacher or are close to a teacher, you understand how much your relationship with administration impacts your job. I'm sure that the relationship someone has with their boss in other jobs has an impact on the job as well, but I can only speak from the perspective of education. Teaching is a hard job, especially special education and having an administrator who gets you makes a huge difference. Well, since he's retiring, and has had such a huge impact on me, I was really looking forward to these last couple of months of working with him. 

You may remember that I work with students with emotional/behavioral needs. I had a student this year who was an eighth grader. He's been in several schools through out his career and has struggled more than I would like to see any student struggle. We worked really hard and made a lot of progress. I was looking forward to working with him towards his high school transition. Helping him feel ready and comfortable with this move, knowing that I was handing him off to someone who was going to continue to work with him towards to the success that I know he can make. 

The last day of school is supposed to be very exciting. We have fun and do things that allow us to close out the year on a positive note. (It's always important to me to send kids out on a up note, if at all possible, so that they are more likely to be excited to come back.) I love standing at the doors during bus duty telling kids good bye/have a great summer, signing yearbooks, and giving hugs (side hugs, of course). Each year when the buses start to roll, all the teachers on bus duty go out and wave good bye to the buses. Once the kids have headed home, my principal usually chooses a very appropriate song and plays it over the intercom. It's an event. There's a conclusion. Well, none of that happened this year.

We didn't get our eighth grade picnic, yearbook signing or last day of school hoorah. Instead we had an "item reunification" appointment that allowed the kids to enter the building, turn in their Chromebook/library books/text books, clean out their lockers, and get their awards/report cards and yearbooks. There were no long drawn out walks down the hall to the bus because the kids don't want to say good bye to each other. There were no hugs or waves to the buses. There was just a thirty minute appointment. It was anticlimactic and it was very hard. It feels unfinished. (My brother described it as watching a movie and realizing that it ended five minutes ago and I think that's perfect.)

As I sat quietly last night, after the official completion of the last day of school, I began to cry. My female offspring knew I was sad and asked if I needed to talk. We talked a little, but I didn't want to completely unload on her, because she seemed to be handling it pretty well. So after she went to bed, I decided that I needed to let myself be sad. I needed to mourn these little things that were happening, or rather not happening. I realized that I needed to give myself permission to be sad that my girl wasn't going to get to go to the eighth grade formal dance, even if she wasn't sad, it was ok for me to be sad. I wasn't going to just be fine with all this and that's ok. I'm not saying that I should wallow in self pity over the things that I'm missing. I'm just saying that permission to be sad will let me move through this, but trying to pretend I don't care is going to land me in a very angry place.

So I realized as I was sitting on my couch, petting my dog, being sad, that I needed to grieve these moments. Feeling grief for these lost moments wasn't about being dramatic it was about being real. There is no way to let God help me heal if I never acknowledge that I am sad. I know that I can't heal on my own, I need God's help with that. So that means that I have to acknowledge that the loss of these moments is hard so that I can let myself ask God for the help I need.

God wants us to bring Him our hurt. He wants to help us heal so that we can enjoy the moments that we are having. He wants to find the joy in the moments we are presented with each day. So I'm going to work to focus on the found moments, instead of dwelling on the lost moments. However, I am going to give myself permission to grieve those lost moments because that's real. I am going to ask God to help me grieve those moments in a way that lets me heal so that I can find true joy in the moments that are happening.

We snuck a picture to mark the last day of school after the "item reunification" appointment.