It’s been my thing to take Beth to school on the first day of school. It’s been an obsession really. I figure if I’m going to make my kid go to school, the least I can do is take them on the first day, to ease some of the pain. Only today I may have been more pain than relief. Sure, we went out for breakfast at Starbucks. Sure, we went for a walk around the still closed mall. (You may think it droll, but there’s something about getting into a place that’s still closed that’s a little thrilling. In most other circumstances, that something is called burglary. But in this case, it’s not really closed, just all of the stores are. The mall entrances are open for the old folks to exercise. Introducing an antsy eight year old to the senior sanctum of a closed mall is a bit like sport too… boy am I mean.) However, when we finally got to school we had a lot to accomplish in a short time, and all that coffee was wreaking havoc on my normally steady nerves.
We were in the cafeteria, doing a bit of rushing to get her lunch account paid up, when my aspiring third grader admonished me: “be patient dad!”
Just who is the parent here?