No Wonder You Homeschool, Ms. Emily!

My friend Emily has agreed to write a few guest posts while I’m off chasing Guy Kawasaki and other blog babes at BlogHer ’08. Won’t you please give her a hearty welcome and leave her lots of comment crack? She’s totally worth it!

When Chilihead offered me the opportunity to guest blog, I was
thrilled.  What an honor!  What a challenge!  Aarrgh, I haven’t written
in FOREVER, what on earth could I possibly say?  So, after much
thought, I’ve decided to regale you all with a story that is a favorite
of my boys.  My first day of first grade.

Let’s go back in time.  Keep going.  WAAAAAAAY back.  Now STOP.  It’s
1973 and I’m heading off to first grade in a new state and a new school
in Norfolk, Virginia (and yes, we were a Navy family).  My mother,
knowing the importance of a good first impression, had bobby-pinned my
hair the night before in circle curls, with the bobby-pins
criss-crossed in an X to hold them in place.  I was in a brand new
white dress, with coordinating ‘to the knee’ socks and black shoes.
Now, let’s just say ALL of this was for the sake of the ever so
important first impression, I was not a girly girl by any stretch of
the imagination.  I was a tom boy that lacked anything remotely
resembling grace and more times than not, was confused for actually
being a boy.

As was typical in my day, the school children waited outside the
building until the bell rang and only then would the school doors open
and you would move as a throng until you were lucky enough to find
where you were supposed to be.  It’s probably important at this
juncture to say how important school was for me.  I LOVED the smell of
my books, I was a complete brown-noser with my teacher (a veritable
treasure trove of the information I LONGED to possess), and yet, I was
also a hopeless introvert who shied away from any kind of communication
with other kids.

I was giddy with excitement waiting for the bell and was running all
around to burn off my nervous energy.  Meeting a new teacher was the
equivalent of meeting Neil Armstrong or, better yet, Gene Roddenberry
(okay, so I was a geek then too). 

Finally, the moment arrived.  The
bell rang and I ran for all I was worth in my new dress, new shoes and
fancy hair.  Because the shortest distance between 2 points is a
perpendicular line, I bee-lined for the door like a bat out of hell.
This was an unfortunate choice because while the other children
actually WATCHED where they were going, I was only keeping my mind on
the prize.  My new, not a scuff or groove flat bottomed shoes found the
edge of a tremendous mud puddle. Based on my velocity, there was no
hope for me.  My feet were sliding as if down a ski slope and the top
half of my body just couldn’t keep up.  I slid for a number of yards
before landing flat on my butt in the middle of the wettest, gooiest
part of the puddle.  Mud was caked all the way up my legs and IN my
dress.  This, of course, was the source of BUCKETS of hilarity for my
fellow school mates, who all stopped their migration towards the door
to take a reflective moment and laugh their heads off.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the end of my tale of woe.  When I quickly
stood up, a boy started pointing at me and shouting at the top of his
lungs, "LOOK everyone!  She has a DEAD FROG on her BUTTTTTTTTTTT!"

Well, crap.  So much for much for first impressions.  It could only get better
from there, right?

Tagged as: first day of school