Bolt Upright

Tonight was Sport’s Christmas concert. And I’m tellin’ ya, you haven’t lived until you have been to a festive holiday pageant about the greenhouse effect. Nothing says Christmas like learning about global warming, clear cutting of rainforests, and solar power.

After getting his foot stepped on one too many times: “Cats are better than dogs. Because dogs have their claws out all the time, they can’t suck them in the way cats can.”

After eating our latest Ethiopian meal: “Mom, your doro wat is getting better. It’s almost as good as at the restaurant now. (Pause) But don’t feel bad, the people at the restaurant, they are PROFESSIONALS at doro wat.”

While reading a picture book about firefighters: “These firefighters are all men. (Pause) I guess the woman firefighter is the chief who tells them what fires to go to. So she’s not in the picture.”

Fair warning: if you can’t stand listening to people brag about their kids, close your browser immediately.

Still here?

Right. Tonight was our “Triad Conference”, which is apparently what you call a parent-teacher conference in this day and age. Highlight: his teacher saying, “He’s just…. a joy. An all around joy. I mean, I just want to take him home with me! But I know I wouldn’t get far.” HEE, and also, Awww.

Other highlight: Sport’s “Me Poem”. The kids took each letter of their names, and wrote something about themselves starting with that letter. Unfortunately I can’t share Sport’s entire poem here without completely blowing his pseudonym. But buried in the parts about playing soccer, and not liking Barbies, and wanting to eat pepperoni pizza, came this line:

“A: Always loving my mom.”

I didn’t cry, but damn, it was a close call. I tell you, that’ll get me through at least another year of broken sleep and 5 am wake up calls. Sometimes I need to be reminded just how insanely lucky I am to have this incredible boy.

It was report card day today at Sport’s school. I think it took me longer to decipher his 4 page report card than it did for him to do reach his “outcomes”.

He got mostly “P”s, if that means anything to you. It sure didn’t to me. There are also some “C”s which are good! Who knew? And a couple of “A”s, which are not as good. (Who knew?)

Could we please just revert to alphabetical order? I know I sound like an old fogey here, but seriously, what was wrong with letter grades? Ah well, at least he didn’t get any “T”s, since as any Hogwarts student can tell you, that stands for Troll.

Sport walked in just now while I was on the computer and delivered the following punch to the gut:

“Mom. In Ethiopia, I fit in. In Canada, I don’t  fit in.”

“Do you think so?  What do you mean by “fit in’?”

“In Ethiopia everyone has brown skin. In Canada almost everyone has white skin.”

“Well, there are people in Canada with all different colours of skin, because people here are from all over the world. Like S and J at daycare, or B and F in your swimming class.”

“Some people have brown skin, but most people have white skin.”

“That’s true. Would you rather live somewhere where there were more people with brown skin?”

“Yeah. Except the bad thing is then I would have to make new friends.”

Not unexpected or anything, but still a reminder that challenges are going to be completely outside my experience.

Oh, it went just fine, of course. No 11 pm come-get-me phone call, no 5 am come-get-your-kid-he’s-making-us-mental call, and I got to sleep in until 8:30. I’ll tell you, there is not much sadder than realizing that 8:30 now qualifies as “sleeping in”.

The only drawback to the sleepover, according to Sport, was this shocker: “Mom. Did you know that some people don’t eat breakfast on Saturday until EIGHT O’CLOCK?? That is way too late. I have been up for hours by then.”

Thankfully, he did not wake everyone up at 5 am, which I was a bit afraid of. Although he had been told it was fine to get up and play or read, apparently he just stayed in bed until his friend woke up too. Now if I could just get him to do that at home…

So, sleeping away from home without Mom, check. Since sometime in the next two years I may have to leave him for a week to go and get Little Brother, my intention is to work on some gradually lengthening trial runs, and this was a start. (I say “may” have to leave him because it is possible Sport might come too. It’ll depend on when it happens, how he feels about going back to Ethiopia for a visit, and whether or not I have another adult to travel with me. I’m not too sure how Sport will react when re-immersed in the sights, smells, and sounds of his old home. Handling the transition for a new child along with a possible total meltdown on the other child’s part might be a bit much for me if I was flying solo.)