Back to School!!

Most of my friends have already sent their children off; freshly pressed in their new school clothes, lunchboxes packed with deliberation and love...
Mine will start High School on Monday.
High School.
I don't know about the kids, but I am petrified.
I am vicariously smack in the crux of adolescence, folks. It's just as scary and awkward as it was when I was going through puberty.
I forgot how absolutely crucial it is to have the right clothes... the right haircut... the right bag... the right shoes... (Great training if your best friends in adulthood are raging queens, however.)
It's mind-boggling. I don't know how I got here.
I'm barely even responsible enough to pay my bills on time. I can barely work my own cell phone. And I have the task of readying these children... MY children... for the torturous transition into adulthood. And the roller-coaster that is High School.
It almost makes me cry with the same intensity I did on their first day of elementary school.
I'm excited, though. Excited to share the discovery, the creative thought, the challenges... and even the disappointments of the next few years.
Their personalities are beginning to take shape beyond what I can mold and influence and it's breathtaking to watch the evolution and the metamorphosis of these amazing souls.

I looked across the courtyard at orientation where a sea of anxious faces greeted one another and I couldn't help but give in to faith and hope...
...for the quality of their future.
(And the quality of my own future as I shell out a small fortune for everything from lunch money to elective fees to sports uniforms.)
*Not to mention the pushy lady at Office Max who tried to sell me the $200.00 graphing calculator for my Freshman, only to conclude her diatribe (after I declined to invest) with "Yeah, you'll probably want to check with her teachers since this calculator is banned in most high schools."
The same calculator you just spent the last 10 minutes trying to sell me?? WTF?? Thanks for wasting my time. Whatever.


I also can't help but get excited that I will no longer have to kick the kids off the computer in order to get work done during the day... and there is the added benefit of having the TV and the PS3 readily available...


Maybe I'll enjoy this back-to-school thing after all. :)