Wistful

This morning, upon leaving for kindergarten, Sofie wistfully put down her dollhouse animals who were camping on the living room rug and said to me, "Make sure they have a good time while I'm gone..."

Kindergarten: rhombuses but no stuffed animals

School is continuing to go well, although really bonding with the new kids and making friends is slow. Right now Sofie sounds like she spends her recesses with a girl from another kindergarten class who was in her swimming classes this summer. Nonetheless, she seems to be making friends. Yesterday we were on the playground in the morning, waiting for the bell, when two little girls ran by holding hands and then backed up and screeched to a stop in front of us.

"HI SOFIE!" they shouted, and then off the three of them went, giant backpacks swinging wildly behind them.

I stuck around to make sure she got to her classroom after the bell, but when it rang she took off with her friends for the door without so much as a glance my way. I followed discreetly (I had her lunchbox) and had to laugh as I observed her trying in vain to get through the school entrance in the swarm of many, many bigger kids.

Sofie is not a confident one when it comes to pushing through a crowd or holding her place in line. Given the least resistance or shoving from others, she entirely gives way and will be the absolute last one in line. This was no different. From her initial position in the middle of the crowd, I watched her get pushed further and further to the side until she was basically flat against the brick wall holding on for dear life as all of the first through fifth graders rushed in. She was glad to see me when I came to rescue her. Funny little thing, her.

***

I'm not sure what goes on in kindergarten these days. Sofie came home yesterday telling all about two things:

• Learning in gym class about how running around makes your heart beat faster, which she then proceeded to demonstrate for us at various points throughout the evening, and
• Somewhere she learned what an ellipse, rhombus, trapezoid, and hexagon were. Rhombus? They teach rhombuses in kindergarten?  

Sounds like there's more happening in a kindergarten class than the endless rounds of tinker toys and giant blocks I remember.

***

Today she had her first bout of not really wanting to go. It wasn't exactly antipathy to school as much as the fact that she wanted to keep playing with her doll(cat)house. Why do I have to go? I want to keep playing! she cried. And more stirringly, But there's no stuffed animals there!

Well actually, she told me later, there are some stuffed animals. In a secret place outside her classroom. But all they have are otters and dogs.

She never did tell me where this secret place is.

 

First Day

Kindergarten, good lord, started today. This feels both exciting and cataclysmic. Sofie has been beyond thrilled the past week, full of energy, telling each and every person she has any excuse to talk to during the course of her day that a) she just turned five and b) she's going to school and then basking in the attention this creates.  Everyone is ooohing and aahing about this huge step, us included, but none of them are also feeling sad about it like I secretly am.

 And so the day finally came. She woke up this morning so excited she was bouncing around the house, begging to go even though it was way too early. She strapped on her backpack fifteen minutes ahead of time and sat on the couch waiting to go.

Such a cutie, and so confident. Which is awesome. How did she get to be so big?





Sofie tells me that maybe the neighbor girl who ended up assigned to the same class will be "my best girl" in a way that's both hopeful and sweet. I explain to her that this may very well be but she'll also be meeting lots of other kids and there's no way to know who her best friends will be yet. Kid friendships are tricky things; you don't want to put too much pressure on the idea that any one particular kid will be someone's best buddy.

I'm glad school is starting for her, for all kinds of reasons. She's ready, of course; her teachers, her doctor, pretty much everyone has told us so, and we have no doubts about it. She's reading, she's got all those good interpersonal skills from two years of preschool, she makes friends well and isn't crippled by shyness, teachers tend to like her, most of the package is there. What I'm pretty sure we'll hear about is her ability to sit still and listen. She fidgets, and she still lives in her imagination much of the time and spent most of orientation reading all the signs on the walls of her classroom when she was supposed to be listening.

"They'll knock the whimsy out of her in under a week," one of Brett's friends said recently. I have to disagree. Sofie is a lot like me, and no amount of schooling managed to knock me firmly back into reality at her age. Sofie's got my stubborness and my imagination, and I predict there's nothing that will keep her from pretending (or perhaps believing) she's secretly a cat during school hours. Give her a few weeks and she'll be organizing the same massive-scale, multi-kid cat activities at recess that she was famous for at preschool.