Graduation day

He knows his colors. He can recite the alphabet. He can count to fifteen. He 's memorized his address and home telephone number. He can spell his name and write it so that's it's almost decipherable to the uninitiated eye. He can write with a pencil, paint with a brush and cut with scissors, though he sometimes refuses to perform any of those tasks on demand.

After this day we will say goodbye to the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children forever.

A tear may sting the corners of my eye as I see him standing all fidgety-like in the backyard playground awaiting his preschool commencement. But I won't let it invite friends.

I will not cry. I will not cry. I will not cry.

I'm practically a professional at stoicsm. After all, this isn't the first time that I've witnessed a child of mine graduate from play-school to this-is-your-new-job school. It's the last time.

I will not cry. I will not cry. I will not cry.

He's stil my baby, I remind myself … thankful that even at the ripe old age of almost-four he's still a half-a-foot shorter than all of his school mates. He still looks like my baby even if he insists on speaking in full sentences, understands traffic rules and can tell the difference between a Mustang and a Corvette.

He's not ready to drive yet. There will be more than a decade of big, yellow buses in our future. They will come to collect him in the morning and bring him home in the afternoon.

I will not cry. I will not cry. I will not cry.

“My sister will sit wif me on the bus so nobody will bully me,” he says as if he's reading from a script. His sister … standing behind him. … silently mouths the words “He'll be fine.” as her eyes add the context: “sitting by himself … with the little kids … where he won't cramp my style.”

I shoot her The Look, but I'm not worried. I know they'll work it out. They always do.

“Poor guy,” Ittybit says, wryly. “He doesn't know how good he had it in preschool.”

He stares at her, waiting for an explanation. “What do you mean?”

“The work is SOOO MUCH harder in Kindergarten. You have HOMEWORK! And ASSIGNED SEATS! There aren't any TOYS in the classroom or BIKES on the playground. You can't HOLD HANDS with your friends in the hallway and you NEVER get to go on field trips ever again.”

He shrugs his shoulders. “I don't care. I'll get to ride the bus.”

She winces.

She's spent three years working her way toward the back of the bus, where the oh-so-big-and-mature third graders sit. She knows the possibility of being yanked back to the front to sit with her brother isn't remote.

“The bus is nice if you can sit with your friends,” she brightens.

“But I don't have any friends. … My friends are all going to another school.”

“You'll meet someone on your first day … just like I did. You may even be best friends forever.”

“Shhhhhh,” I say in my best I Will Not Cry accent.

Marilla and her school will soon be a memory.

It's bittersweet. Outgrowing things that have been comforting and expanding into new territory, knowing that eventually what was unaccustomed will be old hat.

I smile as he tries to balance a construction paper mortorboard on his noggin while twirling the tassel, a sparkling tendril of curling ribbon, in his never-still hands.

And, of course, I'll cry.

An open letter to the graduate

Dear Ittybit,

Your last "Special Day" at the Marilla Cuthbert School for Unspeakably Charming Children snuck up on me.

It was the last day in which one of your parents **points to self** showed up bearing healthy snacks that none of your friends would touch with a ten-foot pole.

It was the last day I'd have a chance to slip the photos I'd taken throughout the school year into the bags of your classmates. Photographs tucked in envelopes that you dutifully sealed with "Love" in a color representing their name ... Blue for Billy ... Magenta for Madeline ... Silver for Sierra.

It was the last day in which one of your ever-patient teachers would tilt their heads and cluck in my direction ... as I so obviously hanged the paintings in the wrong place or as I read books when I should have been helping kids put on their smocks so they could paint.

It would be the last time I’d hear their chittering as I broke some other rule ... such as talking to you when you were in line instead of making sure you were all as quiet as church mice.

It's been more than three years since you first walked through the doors of this cooperative preschool ... the very one I went to when I was your age ... the very one I lived above when I was a young adult.

You already know those stories, you say, rolling your eyes and looking upward when I try to retell them.

You also know numbers and the difference between upper and lower case. You can spell you name and recite your phone number. And every day you come home with a new letter and all the words you learned that begin with that letter.

Both of us have learned a great deal these last three years.

In addition to writing your name and remembering your numbers, you've learned to cut with scissors, recognize letters and understand about cause and effect, as it applies to so many things.

On the last Special Day I was finally proficient in hanging the paintings to dry, and collecting all the crafts so that parents wouldn't have to search. I easily did the chores that needed doing ... cleaning paintbrushes, wiping tables, vacuuming floors and taking out the trash.

I didn't even mess up snack time.

"O" was the letter of your last special day.

I brought the things we'd agreed on: Oranges and Oyster crackers and Olives (though you were quite sure no one would eat them). I also brought orange smoothies, blended at home the night before.

You helped. We blended oranges, pineapples, papayas, mangos and bananas with ice and orange juice, squeezing in the juice of a lime for good measure.

When we tested it you gave it your highest praise: "The most delicious of deliciousities I ever had in my whole entire world or worlds."

I beamed. And then I set the blender up for a second time ... this time adding kale to the mix and a plan to call the new creation "Oscar Isn't Such a Grouch After All Smoothie."

But as the kids' luck would have it, the blender broke.

And then your father gave me his patented eyebrow arch: "Kale? Really?"

"Yes, Kale. ... I just wanted to see Ms. Cuthberts' eyes roll back in her head one last time."

I didn't need a green smoothie to do that, all I had to do was put out the green tractor trikes in the play yard.

"In the wrong place again, mom. In the wrong place again."

*Sigh*

Look out Kindergarten, ready or not here I come.

Love,

Mommy

In marriage, some assembly required

The next order of business: The purchase of a ground-based structure resembling an aviation contraption in which many children can play at different altitudes. It comes in a box. A heavy, heavy box. With many pieces.

Who would like to second?

All in favor?

"AYE! WILL VOLUNTEER MY HUSBAND TO ASSEMBLE IT!" I blurted, a little too eagerly, as I registered my vote during the monthly board meeting of the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children.

I was angry with him, you see, and could think of no better way to express my true feelings than to sign him up to sift through a-thousand-and-one teeter-totter pieces. I was giddy just imagining him having to fuse the parts all together with a million-and-one bolts ... on his day off.

Oh, I could see it all so clearly: He'd bring all his tools ... except the one that would REALLY help. The first bolt he'd need, the M80-10, would be in a mislabeled packet on the bottom of the pile, and would turn out to be missing two pieces to boot.

The drawings wouldn't look anything like the parts strewn about the play yard, and some frowny-faced emoticon would vex him as the realization set in that some way, some how, he'd managed to install the whole contraption backwards or inside out.

My voice would ring in his head in sing-song annoyance: "You should have read the directions first."

I pictured a black cloud, heavy with his expletives, hanging low over the playground like a cartoon bubble. Unable to be borne by the wind, it would hover there until Monday when the children arrived, hopefully wearing ear muffs.

For him — a fabricator and installer of large scale sculpture — it would be more like a dare than a busman's holiday. He'd do it, of course, because there's nothing that makes a man feel bigger than when his son thinks he's a superhero. And there's nothing that says superhero more perfectly than a shiny new toy assembled out of shapes no mere mortal could ever imagine.

In this crowd of knee-high beings, there are few paths to superherodom: Wearing a suit of all one color, driving trucks that crush solid waste or being responsible for the coolest plaything on Earth.

Oh sure, he'd be swearing under his breath as he turned the directions this way and that; he'd be demanding to see the designer's credentials once the drawing diverged from reality. But that's just part of the fun. The moment his son gazed at the Not-An-Actual-Flying-Toy (Nor to Be Used as a Flotation Device) and realized HIS FATHER had been the man who made it happen, it would all be worth it. There would be a ticker-tape parade in his honor. There would be praise and adulation. There may even be the unsolicited gift of pie. Pecan pie.

Then there would be the let down. The moment when the gift horse is asked to open its mouth. The moment that inevitably reveals the punishment for that particular good deed.

"That's ... uh ... really nice ... but it would look better over on the other side of the playground. Can you just move it, please?"

I was practically salivating at all the myriad ways this simple mission would be miserable.

*Clap* *clap* *clap*

His applause brings me back from my demented daydream.

"That will be great," he answers cheerfully, giving me a sly look. "We can all go to the school on Sunday and work together as a family!"

Turns out my husband has a few bones to pick with me, as well.

Death takes a holiday

Whenever it’s Ittybit’s turn to lead circle time at the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children there are problems.

It always starts out fine; she counts how many children are in class, duck-duck-goose style, and chooses the correct weather face from the bulletin board to match the environmental goings on outside without hesitation. She recites how many people live with her now with the added joy of being able to talk up her little brother. (He’s cute, but he eats paper.) She tells the class that she’d like to own a cat but that her parents “really aren’t cat people.” She explains that she will be able to get a cat of her very own when she lives in her very own apartment. “That’s what my Mommy told me,” she says proudly.

When Ittybit goes on to describe how many pets ACTUALLY live at our house, though, it gets tricky. It’s always the pets we DON’T have that are the problem.

The teachers know it, too. They try to quicken the pace, hoping to circumvent the inevitable by will and speed. They even try to skip the part about pets all together, but she can’t let it rest.

“Well, we USE to have TWO dogs – Maddy and Maggie – but Maggie died and now we only have one dog, Madeline. That’s her long name. She’s kind of a jerk when she knocks me over. She also likes to lick my brother.”

It’s been a year since our old dog — one of two canine companions — passed away and still Ittybit counts her as part of the family, once removed.

Death is a delicate subject. No one really wants to think about it let alone discuss it, which, of course, is why Ittybit brings it up on a daily basis.

“MOM!!!! Champ ate some paper. He’s not going to DIE is he? ... I. Don’t. What. Him. To. Die,” she stammers in distress.

“Why is she so fixated on death,” my husband quizzes me accusingly, wondering if his wife’s less than sunny outlook on life has rubbed off on our perceptive little girl.
“She’s four,” has become my standard answer. “It’s a natural question.”

I was just about four the first time I realized the world wasn’t such a wonderful place.

There I was, happily unaware, sitting in the backseat of my parents’ Buick when the radio news reported a story about a mother who had murdered her children.

I understood the words but not the situation. My brain turned over more words: “People kill people? Not possible.” I took a long look at my mother in the front seat and wondered … “Could she?” But I never uttered a word. I just sat there and wondered. Eventually I started asking questions about people from history who HAD killed other people. I made my parents explain why John Wilkes Booth would want to assassinate Abraham Lincoln, asking the same questions over and over again. I wanted to know all the gory details.

But now, a year after we laid Maggie to rest, Ittybit is catching on that death visits others, too.

“Why do people have to die?”

The curtain opens and the spotlight shines in my direction, blinding me with its light.

All I want to do is say: “I don’t know.”

I don’t want to explain that eventually everyone’s body fails them and they go back to the earth. I don’t want to tell her that life is unpredictable. I don’t want to think about it myself now that she’s such a big part of my life.

No, I want to tell her that life is such a wondrous, amazing thing even if you are sick or weak or old; even when it’s raining outside, or when your parents send you to your room, or when you think there’s nothing to do and you’ll never have any fun ever again. Life is grand even if you have to eat brussel sprouts.

I curse my husband’s visible shrugging off of the concept of an afterlife. I don’t want to tell her that some people believe the spirit lives on but that we don’t. The End is too final a thing, and I don’t want to think about any world without her in it.

So I put it off.

I tell her that she doesn’t have to worry about any of that now, and I hope it’s true.

Back to school just another lesson for mom

She wants to be a veterinarian.

That's what Ittybit told me in the car that morning as we drove her brother to the babysitter's house. We had a new routine wherein she doesn't stay with the sitter but rather goes along with me a few miles further to her preschool, and she was getting used to that as well.

Technically, it would be her third first day of preschool. She’s been attending the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children since the tender age of two.

“Tell me again, mama. … Am I going to the four-year class or the five-year class?”

She is four going on 24 and she’s got her life planned out already.

Instead of using the word veterinarian, however, she called it a "doctor for animals."

Who can blame her: Veterinarian is hard to pronounce.

She wants to be a doctor who waits tables and makes pies. She wants to help babies and animals that are hurt and in need of sweets. Suffice it to say she wants to help cats who are sick and dogs with “grumblies in their tumblies.”

But she's going to need assistance, she explains. She's not sure if she can fix an animal that has had its foot cut off, an affliction she's sure will be commonplace in her practice.

She's not sure if there will be "antibotices" when she grows up, either. I tell her she's quite an astute little girl, especially given the up-tick in antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria.

She takes umbrage, and accuses me of calling her stupid.

I tell her astute implies the opposite; that her observations are shrewd.

She's not swayed by my backtracking, but she's excited nevertheless to be going back to class with charming chums and perfectly proper professors.

This time around, however, it's her mother - and not a babysitter - who will get the full weight of the teachers' admonitions when she arrives at school painfully unprepared.

For those of you unaware of the uncommon talents of preschool teachers, let me tell you how incredibly skilled they are at making parents snap to attention not by raising their voices but by raising a single eyebrow.

See, unlike most working mothers of young children, preschool teachers are exceedingly organized. They know exactly what needs to be done in all manner of trying circumstances:

And aside from teaching their young charges to follow simple directions, become accustomed to sharing and social interactions, not to mention recognizing their own names and coloring inside the lines, what preschool teachers do best is teach children how to remind their parents of all the things they are messing up:

Teacher says I should have boots when it's raining;
Teacher says we need mittens instead of gloves;
Teacher says our hats should be attached to our coats;
Teacher says we need snow pants instead of snow suits;
Teacher says my clothes need nametags.
Teacher says you didn't hand in my book order, mom. … MOM? Did you forget my book order?

Mom? Mom? Mom?

I’m forever wondering how it is I’ve managed to raise a child who not only speaks in complete sentences but also points out my failings with such eloquence and grace in each and every one of them.

As my child learns to ask please and thank you, as she learns to wash her hands with soap before meals and keep her hands in her lap until everyone is seated at the snack table; I am reminded that we live like wolves.

She comes home from her first day of school bearing pictures she’s drawn and crafts she’s made. She talks about the things she’s learned. Meanwhile she also wonders why it is we don’t sit politely, hands in lap, waiting for daddy to bring his own plate to the table before we dig in. She’ll tell us that we should use our indoor voices; and that her brother shouldn’t eat with his hands; and that she really doesn’t understand how a person is supposed to eat without a full mouth.

“I think you mean shouldn’t talk with your mouth full.”

“Oh yeah,” she’ll laugh. “That sounds better.”

After she eats however many bites she’s negotiated before the meal, she’ll set her dishes precariously upon the counter above the dishwasher. Then she’ll turn and chastise her father – the chef - who’s moseyed on over to the freezer without clearing his plate.

“There won’t be any dessert for you, mister man if you don’t put your dish away. …”

He laughs, takes his plate and puts it down for the pooch.

“… And I don’t think you should feed those leftovers to the dog … it might upset her tummy.”

“Next year,” I tell her, “you’ll be heading off to college.”

“Will you still drive me? Because I think I’ll be a little afraid of getting on the bus.”

Rad mommy ... I mean Bad MOMMY!

Apparently I've lost my moral compass. I know I had one. It was here somewhere, buried under the stacks of unopened junk mail in the kitchen, or perhaps mingling with the detritus in the disaster area I call my purse.

But according to officials at the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children (or MCA-UCC for you acronym lovers) where Ittybit attends classes twice weekly, it is gone and I am officially a menace.

A hipster mom. A woman woefully bereft of common sense. I may already be on some early education watch list.

I'm going to say it all started because Ittybit learned to dress herself, and has apparently adopted my penchant for the color black and silly, decadent things that conservative, mommy types who live in the suburbs shouldn't enjoy.

In her self-chosen black Little Girl Big Attitude T-shirt, accessorized with Jolly Roger emblazoned legwarmers covering her exposed arms, we groove to pop tunes and hip-hop in the car; she asks for Bank Job by the "Naked Old Ladies" and sings Black Eyed Peas’ "Let's Get It Started," at the tops of her lungs.

Now, it's not that we didn't try the kid stuff. I suffered through The Wiggles and Barney just like every parent of every tot in the Western hemisphere. I even came to love Elmo despite his red furry insistence on referring to himself in the third person, but Ittybit moved along to our Dave Matthews CDs as easily as I followed to my folks into Folk.

It wasn't intentional. It was pure luck. To have her actually prefer my musical preferences to those of her peers seemed nothing short of miraculous.

But when she takes off her coat in the brightly painted pre-school, and the prim and proper teachers notice the skull and crossbones-knitted woolens warming her arms, two words that never would have occurred to me at this juncture become abundantly clear: DRESS CODE. And listed prominently under the heading "INAPPROPRIATE" would be the Jolly Roger.

Mind you, I saw an inkling of this strict adherence to suitability the last time I showed up at the decorous academy to do my part by assisting with snacks and tripping over myself and the many tiny chairs. Ms. Cuthbert had asked ittybit, as is her custom on a child's "special day," to recite how many people live at her house.

"Mommy, Daddy and MAD-O-LINE the dog ... Maggie dog used to live there, too. But she died. She's buried in the backyard. ..."

"OH KAY" sings Ms. Cuthbert with the distinct tone of uncertain surprise one might have when unexpected unpleasantness escapes its moors. "Moving right along ..."

As a parent teaching their toddler to accept death as a part of life, and as a woman who believes we are fast becoming a society that can't see the forest for all the trees as we try to clear cut to our moral high ground, I find myself wishing that I could muster some righteous indignation. Just enough to show my distain for prejudice based on outward appearances.

I want to rail against how we’ve all come to fear things that are not bathed in sweetness and light, cuteness and bows; and the thinking that the wildest hair color or the wackiest clothing is a dangerous thing.

Skeletons, after all, have a prominent place in medical and anatomical education, too don’t they? Well? Don't they?

The thoughts in my head become as shrill as a scream. But then I realized I signed up for this. By becoming a parent I had willingly joined a club with strange rules and customs and members who have different ways of seeing the world, let alone chart its course. And as a new community member, I'd have to navigate the waters with care so as not to sink the ship. Even though I still see no harm in a pint-sized pirate, I also see no reason to shiver the timbers. Not just yet, anyway.

Ittybit's visiting pen pal parcel post

Ittybit was pleased with herself. More accurately, she was pleased with the paper doll her teacher at the Marilla Cuthebert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children had given her to decorate, which she promptly named after herself and painted pink.

"Look, mama! It's me. Only I don't have a sheep. And I don't have blue eyes. And my hair's not that long. ... But it's ME!"

Having an artwork doppleganger is not easy, though. These characters are incredibly hard to work with; you can't hang them on the wall with the other artwork (that would be uncomfortable) and transportation - since they must travel wherever we go - is an issue because they are incredibly fragile and prone to tears and creases.

But trek with her we must as the Flat Ittybit - like her literary cousin, Flat Stanley - enjoys looking out of the car window while we run errands.

"What?!? We can't leave her in the CAR when we go shopping! You never leave kids in the CAR!"

Thus Flat Ittybit has gone grocery shopping with us; she's gone to the park and to play dates. Sometimes she's had to stay in the car but we've been diligent in checking in on her and never straying too far.

When the mother of her pen-pal (a nice little girl named Jaylene in Taiwan) saw a recent photograph of Flat Ittybit and suggested we mail her overseas for a visit, I knew it was going to be a tough sell.

"I don't want to send her away. I want to keep her here."

"I know. ... But don't you think it would be fun to send a Flat Ittybit for a vacation? She could pretend to be you and then your pen-pal friend will take her to all the places she loves and send you pictures.

"No! It would NOT be fun. I do NOT want to send her away."

With that she began to cry.

"Ok, ok. Don't worry. We won't send Flat Ittybit away. ... In a few years, when you understand, maybe we'll send her sightseeing."

She stopped crying.

"What don't I understand?"

"It's a project," I say, emphasizing the magic word. "It would be like YOU were traveling and seeing the sights. Your friend could even send you a Flat Jaylene, and we could take her to all the places YOU like to go."

"Like Hoffman's Playland?"

"Well, Hoffman's is closed for the season."

"How about the zoo?"

"Well, we won't be near a zoo for a while."

"This doesn't sound very good, mom."

"How about the state museum? We could take Flat Jaylene to ride the carousel."

"That would be fun."

"We could bring her to your dance class."

"That WOULD be fun. Let's do it. Let's send her to Wantai."

"Taiwan."

"Oh, right." >

And with that we agreed to send Flat Ittybit to Taiwan. The problem now will be making sure she has comfortable accommodations for the trip.

"Let's make a hole in the envelope, mama. Then she can have a window seat."

Stay tuned. ...

I should have known better

I'm back in high school. At my age it's just humiliating to have to return because of a mistake. It seems I am one credit short of graduation. Even though I've earned a bachelors' degree in the meantime, I have to make it official and earn my high school diploma. The only problem is I can't seem to make it to first period gym class -- ever.

It's the same dream over and over again.

I get through a school year only to realize I've never attended a single first period class. The dream varies on occasion -- one night I miss history and another I miss an entire year of math -- but the gyst is always the same: I'm flunking out because I can't seem to remember to go to class.

I understand such dreams are common, but I'm blaming their frequency these last few weeks on the sad fact that it's the back-to-school season and because Ittybit will be returning to the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children in the Fall. It's irrefutable proof that my baby is growing up, and soon she'll be in post school rather than preschool.

Two years ago she could barely walk from one corner of a room to the other and now she's trying on every sneaker in the shoe store, wondering which one will make her jump higher and run faster in the tiny tots' tiny playground, not to mention selecting a pair she believes will give her enough "entergy" to jump to the moon.

And not only do I have to come to terms with my baby's eventual independence (and astronautical aspirations), but also the fact that when it comes to the rudiments of elementary education, I am in a sub-remedial category.

Why just the other day while speaking with friends about their vacation plans I incorrectly identified Charlotte as being located in South Carolina. I even tried to cleverly conceal my stupidity as they snickered uncontrollably by asserting that GEOMETRY was not my forte. GEOMETRY! Of course then I just put my finger in my mouth, made a popping sound and blamed "mommy brain" for my sudden lack of intelligence.

But the truth is the brain bust wasn't sudden. I am horrible at geography. I am one of those people who say we're going "up to New York City," or "down to Canada" for the weekend. It's painful. But it's more than maps and locations, I'm also unsure of a lot of other basics. All those things we learned by memorization? Yeah, well my memory isn't what it used to be. I joke that if I have to learn one more phone number my own number will be squeezed right out of my memory, only it's the kind of joke that rings true.

So I'm looking forward to helping the kids with their homework about as much as I'm looking forward to an ingrown toenail.

As it is, helping out in the preschool classroom has proven me to be on the low end of the learning curve. I'll run down the list of egregious things I've done in case you missed them: I've allowed children to finger paint when they were supposed to be painting with bushes; I've hung artwork right smack-dab in the middle of the walkway through the painting room and the kitchen; and allowed my kid to wear skull and crossbones leg warmers to school, a completely inappropriate item of clothing regardless of the popularity of pirates.

But back to school we go, both of us. She will have a few new outfits and a new pair of sneakers that make her jump higher and run faster and I will have a nervous breakdown.

Fractions? Integers? Spit infinitives? Intercoastal waterways? The periodic table of elements? Paste? They all scare me to death. I might as well be standing in front of an audience in my underwear. Another common dream, I'm told.

Do they have preschool night courses for mommies?

If you ever want to feel the true weight of your dreadful parenting skills pressing down upon you, spend the day at a pre-school. I promise you will learn a lot about your shortcomings.

Every so often I am called upon to attend lessons with my daughter and her classmates at the Marilla Cuthbert Academy for Unspeakably Charming Children (or MCA-UCC for those of you who insist upon academic abbreviations — you know, for the bumper stickers).

As a cooperative pre-school, the MCA-UCC relies on parents to take turns in all tasks relating to upkeep, maintenance and the supplying of wholesome snacks. Helping children struggle into painting smocks and elaborate costumes to fulfill their wildest dreams during their child's "Special Day" is just a bonus.

The MCA-UCC is a place where all the children stand in line, take turns and play with wild restraint. When they forget and play with abandon, the teacher sings a reminder that children are to use their "walking feet," or turn on their "listening ears," or sit on their bottoms.

It becomes clear how reinforcement and expectation becomes part of any behavioral outcome. No one ever says "No." Instead they say: "We don't throw toys." "We don't eat paste." "We use indoor voices."

Such wonderment must be experienced first hand.

As a parent whose experience with tantrums has resulted in chocolate for dinner, no hair washing for days and more television than the FCC censors have ever seen, I can tell you teachers of small children are genetically different from the rest of the human race.

Whereas, I have one tiny gladiator to wrestle into a coat, she has 10.

Kids who develop hearing impairments at home as soon as you remind them to wash their hands after using the potty, or wipe their feet at the door are happily obliging the kindly headmistress. Eventually, everyone at school starts using their listening ears and their indoor voices. The accounting alone is enough to make you nominate her to a high-ranking
position in the United Nations.

I've been through the Special Day drill twice so far this year, and each time I feel as if I need remedial intervention.

When one kid in my charge dips his hand into the paint and drags it across his paper, she zips over with a paper towel, apparently observing with the eyes in the back of her head, and reminds us "We use brushes," in the same jovial tone.

Oops. My mistake.

"I'm just going to hang this over here," she sings as she relocates artwork I've hung right above the walkway. "Otherwise you're going to get painted. And we wouldn't want that."

Uh. Sorry.

"We use one puzzle at a time," she reminds as I sit with pieces from at least six puzzles strewn between three puzzlers.

Oh. ... I didn't even think.

I sit in awe as the three children I've just spend an unsuccessful 20 minutes trying to costume in elaborate dancewear, disappear into the main playroom. Not one -- not even my own Ittybit -- heeds my beseeching to come back and reverse the process. I panic. Snack time is fast approaching and if it takes 20 minutes to untangle them from the plumage there will be trouble.

"Um… Miss Cuthbert?" I stammer apologetically. "I can't get the kids to take off their costumes."

With a knowing look, she conjures the magic words: "Oh, girls, when I ring that bell you’re going to want to be ready for snack. And that means you'll have all the play clothes put away."

And wouldn’t you know, before you can say "abracadabra" all three are back in the dressing room, tugging off their costumes and handing me their shoes. Proof, I have to believe, that teachers have supernatural powers.

Hopefully some will rub off on me.