Chapter One: School

I am writing a raw story. One of those crazy things where you expose yourself to everyone in the planet. Well, here it is: This is chapter one, un-edited. This was a little while back that I started this.

Chapter One: School

I’m standing here in my three-year-old son’s closet and wondering, “Who am I? Who am I?” The question we all must face sooner or later I guess. I hate that it is so cliché.  I wish I were the only one dealing with it, so that people wouldn’t look at me and just know I’ll get through it. It’s a big deal. I feel like it is a make or break thing. If I choose wisely, I could be one of those people that lives differently and experiences life to it’s fullest. If I choose poorly or just gloss over all this, I could end up as the typical housewife who has a midlife crises when her children leave the nest and she is faced with only herself to look at in the mirror every day, while her husband sleeps with the adventurous secretary who hasn’t sold herself out to her kids and husband and forgotten who she was all those years.  I know there are other alternatives, but those are all I can see right now.

            It was all those “How to Parent” books I read. Even worse, the “How to Homeschool” books. Yes, I home school my three children. As if being a normal mom wasn’t enough of a challenge, I had to go and home school. Why? Simple. I am eccentric. Somewhere along the line, home schooling seemed like it would be fun!  I had visions of my kids and I studying rocks by going out on a hike and touching and feeling them. Learning about the water cycle while laying on the grass of an open meadow or park watching clouds float by.  Learning all the different flower parts and species while we grew an amazing garden. Reenacting historical events in costume.  Being gathered around the fireplace reading aloud from a great book that we just couldn’t put down. That was home schooling in my mind. It was family and knowledge and fun wrapped up in a perfect package.  

Well, enter homes schooling experts. (Those people that are trying to sell you their way to do things.) Everyone has a theory. Everyone’s theory is the right way. If you don’t do it the right way, you will basically ruin your children’s ability to learn and function as an extraordinary person in life. You will kill their love of learning or leaves gaps in their education. You will ruin their relationship with God… catch my drift.

            Some unimpressionable people would blow these “experts” off and follow their heart. That is not me. I am very impressionable. (Something that I have grown to despise about myself.) I eat up what these experts say and try to fulfill it. I try to change myself to fit their mold. I consistently try to be that perfect homeschooling mother and do what is best for my kids. The only problem is, I hate it! It’s not fun. It stresses me out and makes me cranky. I constantly try to forget myself and mold my life around these three little angles that all have different learning styles and personalities, leading inevitably to a break down every few months when my motor can’t push against the wake any longer!  Aghh!!!

            I realize that I have been poorly programmed and I want to deprogram what I have been told. I want to regain my naivety and bliss. I try to do this. I reschedule my day. I come up with a new plan. I put my kids on the waiting list at a charter school because I don’t want to deal with it anymore. I get depressed and my house starts to look like a TLC show needs to stop by and do a “Clean Sweep.”

 Yet, through it all, the little voices of the experts bleed through. The numerous studies that have been done proving their point, etch at my mind. The sad thing is, I wonder if it is more about me being a failure, than me wanting the best thing for my kids. I haven’t decided which one of those points drives me the most yet. Right now, deep down, I hate life. I wonder why God had to put us here in the first place. Why couldn’t he just place us in heaven where we could be in perfect relationship with Him always? I know the answer, but I am depressed and ignore it.