Four days

Yes, I do apologize for disappearing from the blogging world for the last month. Life happened, and this time of the year always brings more activities than we should healthily handle at one time. Or maybe I just see it that way because I don't like to commit to anything that I can't give 100% of my attention to-thus making me feel like I am trying to juggle way too much and only give about 50% to each activity. I took a much needed break from all writing in general. Hopefully the end of school this week will allow me to focus again on writing and blogging.

With that being said, these last four days speak so many different things to me right now, depending on what my perspective is.

As an AM Pre-K teacher, watching my kids squirm around anxiously awaiting summer, listening to them shout and scream all morning as they "talk" to each other at their tables while working on a project, and feeling rather defeated at seeing their very real lack of motivation to excel, I just breathe a sigh of relief and think, "Only four more days."

As a PM Pre-K teacher, I watch my kids work together so well, encourage each other, cheer each other on toward excellence, and arrive with a truly contagious enthusiasm every day. They started out the year so young and lost, and now they are ending the year so much more mature and independent. With sadness over knowing our time together is ending so quickly, I sigh and think, "Wow. Only four more days."

As a mom of an eighth-grader, I am thankful we survived those "dreaded" middle school years. I am thankful David no longer has to start his day an hour later than the rest of us. I am thankful he and Juan David will be on the same schedule next year and will attend the same church activities and camps. Then it hits me that my baby will be in high school, and I want to savor these last four days, desperately trying to make time slow down.

As an adoptive mom of an 18 year old, I have so many mixed feeling about Juan David embarking on his senior year. I think to myself, "I just barely got you home, and now here we are getting ready to mobilize you to spread your wings and enter the world of young adults." I don't know what awaits him a year from now, and I don't even want to think about it. Since he came to us so late in life, there's so much that I never got to teach him. I can't take away the negative exposures and habits he picked up all throughout his life, but I can only hope that what we model to him is sticking and will show up in his character at just the right moment, even when nobody's watching. I hope I don't waste a moment of these last four days of this current school year.

As a writer, all the busyness of soccer tournaments, school meetings, and school and church EOY events has left me feeling like I'm on overload when really all I want to do is write and color. Hopefully the summer months will get me back into a rhythm of writing, reflecting, and embracing the simplicities of life. Just four more days! I can't wait!