Scene: Storytime at bedtime tonite.
Miles, (sorrowfully): But I don't like it when the beyoofull flowers die and all of the seeds blow away!
Me, (assuredly): I know. Mother Nature gave everything it's season, babe. And don't you love to blow those blowing flowers into the wind and make wishes as they sail off to land on the earth to make more beautiful dandelions?
Miles, (almost crying): No and I...um...! I just want them to stay golden and beyoofull and... not die!
Me, (almost crying): Even if one small flower can send out all of it's tiny seeds and make a hundred dandelions?
Miles (calming): No, mama.
Miles Lighthorse, 3 1/2 years. This morning was his first day of preschool.
My little guy is growing up. He's been wanting to "go to school" for almost a year now and today he finally set sail into the world into a two half-days-a-week program after being under my protective wing for this long. It was a bit rough on him. The teacher, Miss Lupe, finally created an inroad for herself by showing him how to put paint in a pizza box and roll a marble around in it over a fishie cutout and create some colorful swirls. But she also confessed that at one point he pulled his hat over his eyes and clamped his hands over his ears. I phoned after he'd been there for two hours and they put him on the phone. "I'm tired of being here", he'd said, woefully. Ivy and I piled into the car and drove immediately to pick him up. I found him on the playground looking a bit overwhelmed. The other kids seemed to be moving so fast. He looked like someone in a movie scene, caught in slo-motion while everyone else races around. He's a very conscious and sensitive fellow and when my eyes met his, he looked at me with such relief, as if just the connection to someone who knows him was all he needed to find his light again.
He wants to try again on Thursday and B and I agreed that it will be good to keep trying as long as he wants to go. I may end up picking him up after two hours for a few weeks, but I'm willing to do it so he can decide whether this environment is nourishing to him. I can see the potential at this larger preschool for him to have fun and learn how to integrate into a group. But part of me yearns for a little intimate setting which is slower paced and more thoughtful. I don't know of a place like that here.
While we wait, painfully, to see how he will adjust, I'll keep looking for a place that might be better suited for him. It was so hard to send him off today. Part of it felt like I was throwing him to the wolves, not knowing what loneliness feels like to him or if he was being heard. He speaks so quietly and softly, my fear is that he might have felt invisible there. But perhaps that wasn't the case. It's really the first time I've ever had to wonder.
*sigh*
Tiny seeds all eventually blow out into the wind to find their own way in the world. Knowing that doesn't make it any easier.
