Yesterday was The Boy's first day of Kindergarten. I went late to work to join the family on the walk there.
The weather was beautiful, The Boy was excited, the camera worked, everything went as well as could be hoped. The kids (and parents) gathered outside the school in a courtyard as the teachers waited for everybody to arrive. TB recognized a few faces from his preschool program last year, which helped with his comfort level. The families gathered there were reassuringly multiracial, just like his preschool had been, so TB will get some exposure to reality. His teacher was calm, TW and I kept our composure, The Girl was well-behaved, and I couldn't have asked for it to go any better.
Driving to work after that took real effort. When the mask fell, so did a few tears.
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Yes, I'm biased, but he's a great kid. He's weirdly wise for his age:
TB (calling me at work): What are you doing, Daddy?
DD: Oh, just catching up on some paperwork.
TB: What do you do with paperwork, anyway?
As taxing as he can be at home, he's a little gentleman in public. He plays enthusiastically and well with girls and boys, and is usually the social glue holding any given set of kids together. He can be disarmingly sweet:
The Wife: What do you want to be when you grow up?
(pause)
TB: A Daddy!
He's ridiculously ready for school, and the school is great (and public! And close to our house!). I know it'll be good. TW and I are proud of him. But it's still a milestone, a step in the gradual moving away from the little guy he's always been to the young man he'll be. He's not a preschooler anymore. He's moving into ages I remember.
He's oblivious to all that, of course. To him, this is just the next step. It's a place to make new friends, learn new things, have fun, go on field trips, and just get out of the house. (Keeping all that boy-energy in the house is a challenge beyond measure. How TW does it without going postal, I don't know.) He'll come home with stories about boogers and school lunches and kids throwing up; we'll experience the joys of navigating the public K-12 bureaucracy (they have no idea who they'll be dealing with – Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!); The Girl will gradually sneak her way to that age. Soon it will be quotidian reality.
I just didn't know it would be this soon.
