Growing Up Is Hard To Do

My wife Carol and I have finally graduated from sixth grade.

And let me tell you something: We’re not happy about it.

Actually, we’re despondent over the entire sad situation. After 10 solid years of being the proud possessors of at least one elementary school kid, we are now suffering from elementary school withdrawal.

Our entire personal supply of elementary students has been completely exhausted. Our youngest child, Kate, entered seventh grade this month.

So we’ve been flung out the door of Jefferson Elementary, into hellish limbo, which is where secondary school parents go.

Our daughter’s sixth grade graduation actually took place last June. But only now has the enormity of the situation truly sunk in. Last week, Carol and I both checked the calendar to see when the Jefferson Elementary open house would take place, only to remember: Our presence is no longer required at the Jefferson open house.

Nor will our presence be required at the musical programs, the awards assemblies, or the barbecues. It’s this last item that gets to me the most: I prided myself on grilling up hundreds of the most overdone burgers imaginable at Jefferson Elementary barbecues. The goal was not juicy succulence, but the total cremation of all bacteria.

That was my major contribution to Jefferson, along with the fact that I operated the spotlight at the annual talent show.

You didn’t expect me to do much more than that, did you? I’m a dad; that’s my excuse. Dads need only show up at the parent-teacher conferences twice a year to be showered with praise about being “deeply involved with their children’s education.” Meanwhile, elementary school moms do all the heavy lifting.

That’s the way it was with us. Sometimes it seemed like Carol practically lived at that school. She always volunteered time in her children’s classrooms, on the theory that a few hours a week with the little darlings was as close to home schooling as she would ever want to get.

She also served as the vice president and treasurer of the PTG (like the PTA, but with a G, which I believe stood for Parent-Teachers Gang). The gang that Carol ran with was always organizing teachers’ breakfasts and talent shows and heaven knows what else.

It was a terrific bonding experience, kind of like being in ‘Nam together. In fact, we met most of our closest friends through that elementary school.

But now, we’re all walking around in a fog, wondering if there is a future for us.

Of course, we can do most of the same kinds of volunteering in middle school and high school. Carol has already signed up to volunteer in one of Kate’s classrooms.

But somehow it seems different. Maybe that’s because our daughter has specified that when in her seventh grade English classroom, Carol should not (1) speak to her, or (2) acknowledge her presence in any way. Hmm. That was not one of the rules in, say, second grade.

So Carol and I are still gazing with envy at all of those bright, shiny new kindergarten parents who will be trooping to the elementary open houses in the next few weeks. They don’t know how much fun the next seven years can be.

All we can do is encourage them, in the strongest possible terms, to put in plenty of quality time in their schools during their all-too-short elementary careers.

Then they, too, will someday feel the way we do: despondent as heck and clinically depressed.

, DataTimes MEMO: Jim Kershner’s column appears Saturdays on IN Life.

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Jim Kershner The Spokesman-Review