May December—An American Gothic Horror Story
Or, the school year is coming to an end and it's time to prepare for summer
This is a May-December story.
No. Forget December. It’s over. The Christmas presents are stale, returned, forgotten. No one cares about December anymore.
May is still afloat, but barely, for only one more day. Then May trickles into June, but they’re basically the same for they herald the end of school.
The children cannot bear the thought of dragging themselves into the classroom for one more day.
The teachers are completely exhausted by the children.
The parents are over-scheduled, sleep-deprived, and drowning under the weight of a to-do list that has swelled as if it’s caught a sudden case of edema.
Remember the promise the end of school held when you were a child? The promise of summer? Family car trips to a beachy idyll, being carefree and buffeted by waves under the bright sun, ice cream, barbecues, and picnics, warm summer evenings twinkling with fireflies keeping time to the steady, quiet hum of cicadas?
Those days are over. They are replaced by the following non-exhaustive to-do list:
Ensure your children are aware they have exams. If they fail, at least you asked.
Attend all school walk-throughs, recitals, sports games, final PTA events, and luncheons. These will be scheduled every day until the last day of school. You will likely never see those teachers/coaches/parents again, but it’s imperative that you acknowledge how much work they’ve done for your child.
Attend all graduations. It’s imperative that you acknowledge how much work your child has done, as it’s 100% likely that you’ll see your child again.
Back to the teachers/coaches/tutors/principal—have you purchased each of them a personalized gift as well as contributed to the class gift as well as donated to the PTA, donated to the staff appreciation luncheon, donated to the food packaging event, donated to the elementary school’s “Animal Rights Young Activists Association,” and bought a yearbook?
Complete camp registration. This should have been done in February.
Camp requires medical forms; make sure you have an updated one.
Inventory child’s camp clothes. Seasoned parents can skip this, as none of them will fit.
Purchase camp clothes. Resist the temptation to buy clothes that are a size up; they’ll be too big for this year, and you’ll have forgotten about them next year.
Enjoy peak allergy season.
There will be at least eight birthday parties for your child to attend (bonus if your child’s is one of them). The significance of those demographics is unclear.
Stock up on ice cream.
Stock up on beach toys.
Stock up on summer reading books. Budget in time to negotiate with child about how much reading they have to do.
Plan idyllic beachy summer getaway; these plans will need to be completely changed at least twice.
If you do all of these things, your child will successfully close out the school year and will be guaranteed the same happy memories of summer that you had growing up. You will receive confirmation of this when they tell you they are bored.
Very funny,