56/365 Bree. Is. Home.

YAY.

55/365 School Choice

I often use the quote, "In Sweden, there are only 4 kinds of soap." I don't know where I read it and I don't even know if it's true, or if maybe it just isn't true anymore. I say it when I want to demonstrate how much easier life is with fewer choices. It helps if the choices are good ones, or at least if there's one good choice in a small group, but as Americans we often define freedom as choice (I'm not talking about abortion here when I use the word "choice"; I'm talking about purchasing things, where we live, where we go, what jobs we have, and so forth). Some choices do make us free--not being tied to the land like a serf in the middle ages is certainly better. But I continue to maintain the view that consumer choice does not increase our freedom at all, and in fact it often steals time and, therefor, it could be argued that it makes us less free.

I usually say this when I'm talking about the cereal aisle at the store. But it also applies to schools in my neighborhood. Every family on my block has agonized over where to send their children. Ok, maybe not agonized (a few have), but we all have really thought and considered and weighed our options. In a smaller town, it might limited to:

a. public school
b. the one religious-based school in driving distance
c. homeschooling

Here between the sycamores, our choices are dizzying. Public or private or home, but amidst public are standard public schools, all the magnet schools, and the newer charter schools. Private: Catholic, Lutheran, Christian, avant garde, ritzy, cheap, community based, how many grade levels, and so on. There are a lot of choices and as it turns out, no two families on our block have chosen the same one--well, one exception to that, but that's still pretty impressive.

We attend Oak Grove Montessori, which is a grass-roots charter school. Nate across the street is just starting at a new arts-focused charter school in the fall. Casey, Adam, and Kenna are at a magnet school nearby, Hannigan. Anton is starting high school at Rogers, also a magnet school. His sisters are at (magnet schools) Larchmont and Reynolds.

Several families go to Catholic schools. The Wymans are at Holy Trinity, as are the Sullivans. The McAllisters drive a little further to St. Jude the Apostle. At this point no one attends the Catholic school that is geographically, technically, the parish we live in (where we go to church as well). Nate is leaving there; Anton attended for a time. We might in the future, depending on what Oak Grove decides about middle school.

Bree and Noah go to a small independent school nearby, Arch Street, where Zelda works; Eliza attends Hopkins. Up the street, Jen thinks she'll homeschool and Cicely, who also works at Arch Street, will most likely send her kids there.

What's so nice is that nobody has a bad day at school and then comes home to more bad day. If kids are bickering on the block, they can focus their energies on school friends and have an after school playdate (I hate that word). They learn different things and in fact do share their knowledge. It's been lovely.

But more school choice is coming: Arch Street ends at 6th grade, as does Hopkins. It's a toss up whether Oak Grove will decide to add on a middle school or not. We're all looking and thinking hard. And I'm trying to breathe--Oak Grove landed in my lap without stress or worry (I was going to homeschool). I need to let a few years play out.

And then there's high school.

54/365 Good news for Daisy

Daisy's best friend on the block actually lives on the next block. Bonnie Dee is the middle child in a family of 4--two older brothers and a younger brother. Daisy isn't quite as sandwiched but they're in similar boats. Daisy is 11 months older than Bonnie Dee, and it looked like she'd be a year ahead in school, starting kindergarten this year while Bonnie Dee's birthday holds her back a year. But Joy was walking them down this evening and we chatted a moment. Bonnie Dee's starting kindergarten a year early. I know nothing is permanent, but it's nice to know they'll be together. No, they don't go to the same school, with Daisy at Oak Grove and Bonnie Dee at Holy Trinity, but they'll have parallel experiences the same way the older girls and the middle boys do. It's good news.

53/365 Knee jerk reflex

I get home later in the evening after a long day. It's dark, bedtime, Jake's home with the kids. I get out of the car and glance up at the Paxtons' porch. They're not sitting there in the dark. They're gone. Yes, it is just a week and it's just vacation, but it's a long damned week. My girls are stir-crazy waiting for Bree to be home. And I'm pretty much on my own without adult contact during the work day. So yeah, it's been a long week.

52/365 Girl Games

There's a heavy sigh from the back seat. We're on our way home from dance.

"What's up?" I ask. I get no response. So I do what I do best: ramble to fill the silence. "Tomorrow, we don't have anything going on, really, after I go to the doctor. Aunt Kaylen is coming over to watch you guys. And then nothing until we pick up food in the afternoon. Not a bad day. Maybe we'll make a plan and go somewhere. Eliza will be home after 3 from camp, and Iris--"

"I don't want to play with Iris," she says flatly.

I wait.

"Was she mean at class?" I venture. Iris and Fiona run hot and cold.

"She acted like I wasn't even there," she explains. "Except when I was put on her team, and then she told Miss Katie I didn't belong on her team." But she sounds more frustrated than upset or sad.

"Then give Iris a rest. Who knows what's going on. School will start up again and things will change."

But I have a heavy heart. I know about girl games--I was a victim of them as often as I played them. So hard to not move the chess pieces on the board. So hard to sit back and wait. But I'll try.

51/365 Cucumbers

"Casey, is your dad around?" I ask the oldest child on his bike in the alley. I have four big, but not yellowed, cucumbers in my hands.

"He's inside," he tells me unhelpfully.

"Whatcha need?" Kenna asks me, pulling her bike off to one side.

"I want to give him these cucumbers."

"Cucumbers! I love cucumbers!" she exclaims. "Watch my bike," she points as she runs down the gangway to go in through the front.

Bruce comes out, obviously pulled from rehabbing some apartment inside.

"Brigitte!" he calls before the gate is open. He pronounces it like the French. I can hear Kenna explaining what's going on as their voices get closer.

"I had these cucumbers," I explain. "Grew them this year, and there's more right now than we will be able to eat." I hand them to him.

"Cucumbers and onions coming right up!" he says enthusiastically, taking the cucumbers. "These are great, we'll eat them tonight. You grew them?"

I nod, pointing up the alley to a roofed in section of my yard. Chickenwire serves instead of glass or something solid. It's my squirrel-proof garden cage.

"We will absolutely enjoy these," he tells me. "Thanks for thinking of us."

"Thank you!" Kenna calls after as I head back up the alley.

"Get your bike," Bruce points out to her. I go back into my wooden-fenced yard and listen to kids continue as kids do, playing in the alley like they have for a hundred years.

50/365 Not everyone is gone on vacation

Others are absent for other reasons. The Friedman family across the street is moving into one of their rental properties. Their younger son Adam has some neurological problems in the area of autism (but not that), and now that he has a diagnosis, they are leaving their three story plus basement behind for one of their rental flats. I ran into Bruce about a week ago, having noticed that he wasn't around as often--Jackie and Viv had both noticed as well, since Viv spends most of her days on her porch swing now that they've moved back in after years of saying they were moving, or not moving, or taking care of her mother or selling that house or whatever it was. They're back and she's a porch sitter extraordinaire. So much so that she noticed an absence instead of a presence.

"Are the Friedmans still on the block?" she asked Zelda. And Zelda asked me. We were so afraid it was a foreclosure or avoiding a foreclosure--we know they had property around the south side and couldn't think of any other reason why they would leave their huge house and move into a two bedroom flat with three kids.

"Adam just needs to be on one floor," Bruce explained. I felt so bad about this, knowing they've been hunting down a diagnosis for years. Bruce is older than my parents, although you'd never know, and with his first wife he has kids older than me. This is a second family for him and I don't know why he doesn't drop from exhaustion.

So they've moved in behind me, a few houses down (two doors down from the tent folk). They own the 4-family, so that's an easy fix, but I hope they're doing this in the short term. It's a tight space, especially with a big dog.

Tonight I was picking cucumbers for more pickles and I heard Adam, Casey, and Kenna riding bikes behind me. They're still there. Just between a different set of trees.