And so we come to the end of summer holidays and we return to school…
The kids have been in training for this moment for some weeks now, tucked up in their beds by ten each night, rising at eight the next day, breakfasting by about half-past ten, getting dressed shortly before midday… All totally on-schedule for getting to school on time for nine o’clock… in the evening. I think I now understand why they invented Night School.
This year is going to be a very different one for me. For the first time in seven and a half years, I am going to have some real and regular *Me* Time. Not just the kind of Me Time that is stolen while the children are transfixed to Ben Ten Alien Force Season Two or when I thrust my children into my returning husband’s arms and flee screaming to the local supermarket with a hip-flask of absinthe. I’m talking Me Time which involves two of my children being in school and one child being in kindergarten. For two and a half hours per week.
Yes, two and a half hours! My cup runneth over! But hopefully not with cheap champagne or vodka cocktails because that two and a half hours is on a Monday morning and picking kids up completely shit-faced at the start of the school week is not becoming behaviour for a pillar of the community like my good self.
Of course it will take some time before I actually get my two and a half hours. The kindergarten “transition” schedule takes a very slowly-slowly approach – starting with 45 minutes and increasing each weekly session by 15 minutes until you finally build up to the full two and a half hours shortly before the child’s 18th birthday. Whereas the school transition program, in comparison, is the equivalent of unceremoniously dumping your child in the deep end without a life jacket.
Tomorrow is The Pixie’s official first day at the school. I’m going to be entrusting her to the care of an age-old institution that will see her through the next 13 years to adulthood. My little girl. My aching heart.
Anyway, it’s good to know she’s entering this next phase of her life with no small amount of ambition. Why, just last weekend she asked me “What will you be when you grow up?”
Now, whether the “when you grow up” part was a compliment or an insult, I couldn’t be sure but I decided to push past it and answer her question honestly.
“A writer!” I exclaimed with gusto, sharing my hopes and dreams with my precious little girl.
“No! Not a writer! I meant a real job. Where you actually *do* something,” she replied, somewhat annoyed.
“Oh,” I said. “Could you give me an example of a ‘real job’?”
“Like working at McDonalds,” she replied, adding somewhat enthusiastically “I could come to work with you sometimes!”
Yep, should have seen that coming. But perhaps not her next statement:
“When I’m sixteen, I’m going to work at McDonalds. And then I’m going to get married!”
That’s it, my sweetheart. Aim for the stars! And one day you might just have two and a half hours to yourself like your mama.
Mmmmmmm….. two and a half hours….
If you weren’t in direct competition, I do believe Kerri Sackville would lend you Paolo or Hernandez (his gardening brother).
That Kerri never shares anything…
Enjoy it. 2.5hrs? Hardly worth going back home. May as well just sit in a nice bookstore somewhere and have a coffee. You deserve it.
It’s certainly not enough time to do any dishes or put on any laundry. You need AT LEAST 2.75 hours to do that.
Funny! My brother is as excited as you – he works shift work so is home most days with the kids while his wife works – with the prospect of 2.5 hours to himself. But he put it slightly differently: “I’m going to set my alarm and have a Nanna Nap every Monday!” he excitedly said to me yesterday. Such a man thing to say.
Oooh, Nanna nap! I hadn’t even thought of that…. the possibilities! THE POSSIBILITIES!!!
You go girl! I got a McJob at sixteen, then* got married, and now I’m a writer.
*yes there are many many years in between the two – I kissed a lot of frogs before finding my prince (and loved it!)
You need to change her kindy day to later in the week, when it is totally respectable to be shit-faced before noon. Enjoy your 2.5 hours!
It’s almost the same career path that I’ve taken, too – dining room duty at McDonalds at 16, married at 30 and now wanna-be writer with 2.5 hours up her sleeve at 39. Wow, what a ride.
Congratulations! Make sure you enjoy that time off, the best part of it is you get it EVERY week!
Also, tell your daughter to get married first, then she wont need to work at McDonalds at all! Aaah, such ambitions. 🙂
She already knows who she’s going to marry and everything. This girl knows what she wants and when she wants it and she’s only 5. I’m still trying to decide what to have for breakfast and it’s past 11 o’clock…
Damn those dastardly ‘real’ jobs, infiltrating the sweet minds of our innocent children who should know better, like, how the unreal world is WAY better than the real one….
Real life is soooooo over-rated. Why else would I spend so much time online?
I sense you are using your 2.5 hours to respond to your blog comments NDM. All power to you!
Correction! Today’s session was only one hour and by the time I walked back home with The Pixie, I only had 25 minutes before having to go back and get him. However, yes, I did use the time to respond to my blog comments. That’s how dedicated I am… Soooo dedicated. In fact, worthy of a Bloggie, wouldn’t you say?
What’s more dangerous? A wounded tiger,or the NDM,when she’s on a crusade. I’ll leave others to judge, but she’s got ME nervous……..
Be nervous, fendy. Be very nervous indeed. Remember that I’m standing right outside your house RIGHT THIS VERY MOMENT waiting for you to Vote One The NDM and … oh shit, the bloggies voting is shut. I’ll go home now.
Wow – much going on – that “real job” is a killer isn’t it – I have the lovely situation of “Mum, what do you do for work” ” I’m an Actor” “Really??? I never knew!!!” grrrrr…so the rehearsals you sat in the back of, playing and being shushed didn’t sink in, eh…am thinking of getting a t-shirt with actor/student/mum printed on it for future occasions like that -or the other parents who know me not question of “Are you going to NIDA?” or “what would i have seen you in on TV?” – yes, they are my two options…
Oooh – i am grumpy today – must be getting over bug…
(hope the pixie is loving school btw)
Frankly, life would be much easier if we could just say everything up front on a tshirt. What about one of those digital frames but on a tshirt? Might make wet tshirt competitions difficult, though. Because I go in so many of those.
When you grow up?
That’s a difficult question for anyone. Let alone someone who only has 2.5 hours of me time to themselves a week. And here I was thinking it was going to get easier at some point..
I think the fair thing to say is that it gets easier and more difficult in turns. But it’s always a joy. Except at 5 o’clock in the morning. Or whenever someone is blowing a recorder in your ear.
ha! Your school holidays sound just like mine. Sometimes as a treat they could wear their pj’s all day.
I hate it when I’m putting around the supermarket all by myself humming away to the piped music feeling gloriously alone and I realise how pathetic it is that I get such joy from being alone at the supermarket! It’s not like a trip to the theatre or cocktails on the beach, it’s the supermarket!!
I also hate it when I get sucked into watching Ben10 and waste that ‘distracted children’ time but that Kevin Levin is a bit of a spunk!
Enjoy your 2 1/2 hours NDM!
There you go with your Kevin Levin fetish again. He’s a cartoon character! (albeit a really truly HOT cartoon character – gosh is he well drawn).
Hi–I just found your site a week ago and LOVE it! You crack me up 🙂 And I need that. . .
I have one little guy in foundations (kindergarten?) every day! for 4.5 hours! Woohoo! But one little guy still at home, so alas, no “me” time yet. Every time I think about having another bundle of joy I do the math and remind myself it would be five more years before I get to pee all by myself. Puts things in perspective 🙂
p.s. I voted for you!
Thanks for reading, Lorna – and moreover, thanks for voting!
The best thing about waiting 7.5 years before you claim time for yourself is that 2.5 hours seems like the biggest and bestest gift anyone could ever give you! Oh, other than an iphone (hint hint).
TWO AND A HALF HOURS?!! What kind of lazy-bones, lame-ass kindy is that??!
I thought two five and a half hour days was a little slim at Miss Roo’s kindy but two and a half hours ALL WEEK?! Those poor little tackers are hardly gonna have time to catch up on all the kindergarten goss. They’ll need mobiles so they can text each other after class to fill in all the gaps in their important conversation.. Hell, it’s gonna just DRIVE them to sign up and keep up their senior toddler networking on facebook!
Anyway, I guess it’s better than nothing.. I vote you book in for regular fortnightly massages, with lounging-around in a book cafe wearing a free-flowing silk frock on the off-week. You most DEFINITELY deserve it. x
Thank you Valley Girl – a free-flowing silk frock sounds suspiciously like a muumuu. But I like it. I like it a lot. It means I can smuggle my own chocolate supply into said book cafe.
Oh my little Pixie… the only girl I know who probably has more pink clothes than me! And she is such a big girl now. Hope your journey through your school years is full of happiness and the joy of learning. And maybe even a weekend job at Maccas once you are 16… 🙂
We both know that a Maccas job at 16 prepares you for a life time of humiliation (remember the upside down thickshake trick?) and exploitation. Still, at least I’ve never had to wear anything quite as unflattering as that uniform again!
Ah, working at McDonalds. The absolute pinnacle. But two and a half hours is just the right amount of time to eat lunch, watch some crap tv and well, just generally waste time. Just as it should be.
You’re right: any longer than 2.5 hours, I might feel compelled to do something useful. It’s Just Right.
You’re a writer that’s for sure.
The downside is that the ‘Take Your Daughter to Work Day’ won’t amount to much.
The other day while preparing the ground rules for a game my 5 and a half year old said to me, “OK, Daddy you pretend to be a grown-up….”
Was that “you’re a writer” or “you’re a wanker”? It’s hard to tell.
Love that Master D called your bluff. I reckon he and The Pixie must swap notes on the lack of appropriate adult role models in their lives.
I think I’m jealous. Yup, I am.
You really need to move to the southern hemisphere.
I shouldn’t read this while eating lunch – now I have to try and get lamb and barley soup out of my keyboard as the result of a laugh that went wrong. Two and a half hours alone sounds like bliss – you should do it out of the house so you don’t get tempted to put a load of washing on. A massage followed by a book in a cafe with a really big piece of chocolate cake to replenish all those lost essential sugars from the massage….or something like that.
Apologies for the keyboard incident – barley’s a bitch to get out between keys.