Driving to School and Algebra

Getting through the first week of school was tough. I’ll admit it. I struggled a bit.

I thought we were going to slide into it easy, but no. Elaine set her alarm last Sunday night and when the alarm went off Monday morning, Elaine got up. I thought we were going to lay in bed for another hour or so. It was still dark. Maggie hadn’t even started scratching the bed yet.

Nope, no sleeping any longer, I had to get out of bed. The twins were getting up also. What the (construction language) were they up and happy about it for?

My job is to drive the twins to school. Yes, they could ride the bus, but that would mean getting up even earlier. The twins would need to be at the bus stop early enough to let the bus driver pick up all the other kids, maintain the speed limit and arrive at the school a little before class starts. I like to leave in time to wave at the bus driver, avoid all the other bus stops and arrive a little before class starts.

Unfortunately, the twins get into the truck every morning giving me just enough time to exceed the speed limit and get to school when the bell is ringing.

Boy Twin can waste more time in the morning than anyone. He can walk around the house for at least thirty minutes EVERY morning looking for his clothes, never noticing he is wearing them.

At school the first day of school was great. Boy Twin saw his friends that he hadn’t seen in almost three months. Girl Twin lined out her first sleepover for the year. I was on time to pick up after their school athletics, Girl Twin is playing volleyball. Boy Twin is running cross country.

Boy Twin played football last fall. It was his first year of organized football. I guess it didn’t go all that well. The coaches tried to make him a defensive back. The defensive back assistant coach was/is (I’m guessing) college age. His method of teaching was yelling. Boy Twin wasn’t used to that, he was miserable. Boy Twin might try football again next year in high school.

The first night after the first day of school was not so great. Boy Twin and Girl Twin are in the same Algebra class. Boy Twin has that scientist/engineer thing going, Girl Twin is more of an artist. Boy Twin breezes through math, Girl Twin has to think.

Our (the twins, and now mine and Ivy’s) algebra teacher assigned homework the first night. Mr. Algebra gave the kids 52 review problems and announced to the twins and their classmates, “These problems should take you about fifteen minutes, should it take longer than that you need to go to the counselor and change classes”. Boy Twin took longer than fifteen minutes, but he was hungry and took a break. Girl Twin cried for an hour before WE started. OK, I cried for a half hour myself, Ivy didn’t cry.

After Ivy and I got Girl Twin to quit panicking and quit thinking about “fifteen minutes” things started to click. She will be fine. I’m not so sure about me. I had to use math I haven’t used in forty years. I don’t use a lot of math writing this crap.

The second day of school wasn’t as smooth as the first. Girl Twin got up and asked, “Can we stay home today?” Elaine immediately said, “NO!” I asked. “Can we at least be late?”

Oh…….I forgot to say something about the store. It has blue carpet.

Our crazy lives!

Monner