Thursday, September 30, 2021Tiny
Sometimes the tiniest of moments need to be remembered. Perhaps this tiny moment doesn't really need to be remembered, but it's so very Mila. Everything about it is so very Mila.
Wednesdays are a special sort of chaos. Everybody gets home from school and gets ready for their own brand of after-school chaos. Alexis has dance; Mila has gymnastics/tumbling. That fits, doesn't it? That Mila is leaning into gymnastics and tumbling? I think it fits. I wrap up work earlier than usual, at 5:00, and then throw everyone in the car so I can drive here and there and everywhere to pick everyone up and drop them off and all of that. Normally the last hour of my work day is rather peaceful, perhaps a one-on-one or something like that.
Today, though. Today was extra. An earlier meeting went sideways, which led to a cluster of people gathering after, and basically I was on a call with three people with much more important titles than my own and one of my peers. We were trying to solve A Thing as the clock inched towards 5:00.
As expected, Mila exploded past my office door to change into clothes for gymnastics. She always passes by with flair, which is spectacular. She changed into a unitard and a t-shirt, which means that when she returned to pass by the door again, it looked like all she was wearing was a t-shirt. It happened to be a tiny bit too big, just long enough to completely cover her unitard.
What was important, though, was the wad of dollar bills she had in her hand. Mila has been raking it in from the Tooth Fairy lately, and she was standing in the doorway, proudly waving her wad of cash with the biggest toothless grin on her face. Remember, she looked like she was pantless as she waved her cash dollars and grinned.
And then she LOUDLY busted out, "Don't you wish you were rich like me?" before running away.
It was loud enough for my computer to pick up the sound. I wasn't muted. I was trying to keep a straight face as I watched the little cash money dance.
Clearly, I failed at keeping the straight face. And I will forever be okay with it because THAT is exactly what the tiny moments with Mila are like.
She Has People
Open House.
If ever there were two words that can make me want to shrivel up into a tightly wound ball and rock quietly in the corner, those are the words. I know it's ridiculous that I despise all things Open House, but there it is. I would rather watch a kid wiggle loose teeth (shudder) than slog around a school for Open House.
Guess what brings Mila ALL OF THE JOY? Of course she loves Open House. OF COURSE. She speaks fondly of the last one she had, which was kindergarten. She can tell you about how we talked to her teacher and ran around the whole school and there was even an ice cream truck outside so she got a treat that night. I remember it as an evening of misery and having to fake extrovert, but Mila loved it all.
You know what can really put a damper on Open House? A pandemic. We didn't have one at all last year, a thing which I will forever cherish, but this year? Oh, we're back. No matter that elementary school kids aren't vaccinated and no matter that we probably shouldn't shove hundreds of people inside a building, we have to Open House. It's the public school law.
::eyeroll::
I would have skipped it. I wanted to skip it. But, Mila. She's a mother truckin' ray of sunshine bundled in joy and she was so very excited about the notion of showing me her desk and introducing me to her new best friends. I couldn't come up with a valid excuse to not go that wasn't something like "I don't want to" or "Pandemic-ish" so blurgh. We went.
There were a fair amount of precautions taken to keep things safe, which let's just say is a nice thing to see. We shouldn't be here, but we're in a place where it's positively delightful when schools follow the science and enforce masking and distancing and all of those things. So, yay!
But uuuuugh. Open House. Mila drug me up and down every hall and showed me her desk and then drug me to the other end of the building and I swear I ran a marathon in 20 minutes. I legit needed a nap or ten after being drug all around the place. Of course Mila found a friend so they turned into the Golden Girls gossiping and laughing and telling stories. They were the Golden Girls on speed, though, so they sped up the marathon and covered even more ground running back and forth in the school.
And then Mila disappeared. Her friend was still in sight, but Mila just plain vanished. Like, she was lost. Completely lost.
It's not great losing your kid in a public place, but I think if you're going to do it, their school is a solid choice. At least I knew she knew her way around? I wandered up and down the halls, checking every classroom, with her friend playing the role of Sophia and being all, "Fasten your seatbelt, slut puppy" and running around in pursuit.
It took a solid 10 minutes to find the kid. Which, that was swell. I definitely wanted to spend an extra ten minutes at Open House. Even better that I spent it without a kid at my side and trying to be nonchalant about the fact that I had no clue where she was.
Eventually she showed up. She was with an entire herd of kids because apparently she is the Pied Piper of Open House and built a posse while she was missing? I don't know. I do know it started out with her needing to use the restroom and not thinking to tell anyone that was where she was going. From there, she just started picking up other peoples' kids so that lots of parents could be failures like me and lose their kid at Open House.
Way to make it a memorable event, Mila.
